Little pain, much gain

Physical inactivity is a major public health problem with substantial costs to society. Canadian Family Physician has published articles discussing how physicians can counsel patients on increasing physical activity. Yet, many primary care physicians have difficulty doing such counseling for several reasons, among them not enough time and a lack of training in counseling. To overcome these barriers, physicians could consider doing brief, solution-focused counseling (SFC) rather than the more usual problem-focused counseling. We discovered this type of counseling in use in family therapy. We modified its assumptions specifically for counseling patients on increasing their physical activity.