Practice Philosophy
Steve recently returned to private practice after being at Stanford for eight years (2017 to 2025) and established an Orthopedic Surgery clinic at the Stanford Emeryville campus.
My philosophies and principles of taking care of patients were established when I was initially in private practice, maintained when I was at Stanford and will again be implemented now that I have returned to private practice. This means providing patients with the highest level of personal and professional care within the specialty of Sports Medicine and Orthopedic Surgery.
Two very important aspects of one’s care are first establishing an accurate diagnosis and the second is education in order to gain a complete understanding of the specific condition. With this foundation, an accurate and appropriate treatment regimen can then be started using specific benchmarks to monitor one’s progress towards their ultimate goal.
In the specialty of Sports Medicine, surgery is generally not recommended as the first approach to treatment except in unusual circumstances. Therefore, a wide variety of conservative treatment avenues are utilized as initial treatment options and could include Physical Therapy (aquatic and land based), Occupational therapy, Osteopathic Manipulative Techniques, Acupuncture, Chiropractic, Certified Massage Therapy, Feldenkrais, Pilates, Rolfing, Myofascial Release Techniques, and Aston Patterning.
Additional avenues of treatment include oral and topical medications, dietary changes (decreasing or eliminating processed sugar, dairy, gluten, histamine), possible supplementation, external devices such as splints or braces, and specialized injections. There are three types of injections including Cortisone (decreases inflammation), Viscosupplementation (decreases joint irritation), Biologic injections such as Platelet-Rich- Plasma (theoretical healing of tissue).
The treatment of each patient is individualized and comprehensive so that one’s health can be restored and an active lifestyle can be achieved.