--- If you had to choose the top three things you could not live without for successfully running your massage practice (besides clients, of course!), I bet among them would be your SOAP notes. Because SOAP notes are likely a primary tool for documenting and understanding your client’s needs so that you can tailor their massage to be the most beneficial experience it can be. Clients are always impressed when you “remember” exactly what the issue(s) was the last time they saw you. That kind of professional experience will be one of the main reasons folks will become loyal repeat clients - because they’re impressed with the fact that you care about them enough personally to make sure you’re working on what needs working on... But not all [SOAP note applications](https://www.massagebook.com/marketing/soap-notes/) are created equal, so it’s important to use one that is clear, comprehensive, efficient, extremely user-friendly, and reminds you of client issues. ## **So what are SOAP notes, and why do I need them?** As mentioned above, SOAP notes give you the opportunity to stay tuned in to the issues your clients are experiencing. I’m sure you remember the four key parts to SOAP notes for massage therapy: ### **1. Subjective** This refers to how you perceive the client to be doing and includes how your client looks and feels during their activities. This section is where you’ll record things like the mechanism of injury, chief complaint, symptoms, and description of pain. It can also include relevant medical history, which should take up the majority of the note. Hopefully, you’ve already had them fill out an online intake form or their massage prior to their visit so that you’re not wasting any time getting your clients on your massage table to begin their session. ### **2. Objective** This is how your client is actually doing based on objective measures, including a physical exam, range of motion tests, your discoveries of tissue health while palpating, vital signs, and recent results from any labs or other tests performed outside of your office. To make it simple it means “The data the therapist takes from palpation.” It also means: visual-postural analysis, limps, muscle guarding, holding patterns, inconsistencies in movements, atrophy, hypertrophy, bruises, abrasions, scars, swelling, redness, skin irregularities, varicose veins, breathing patterns, and prosthetics. Treatment goals can be added to define the intention of your massage choices and that they ensure that your treatment plan has a purpose. ### **3. Assessment** This is when the therapist evaluates what she or he is doing, such as changes in the client’s condition because of treatment and/or changes in symptoms. (Sometimes, people include the application in the assessment part.) ### **4. Plan** The plan is the treatment you intend to implement, including long-term treatment plans and lifestyle recommendations. It contains all the required steps and details of every proposed treatment, including therapies and surgeries. It should also outline what you want to review during their next session and include what worked, what didn’t work, what you did not address, and what you want to make sure to work on next time. If there are no changes to be noted in the assessment part, you may have ideas for next time. Recommend the client to get a massage on a regular basis, such as once a week for four weeks. They might not follow it, but at least you are looking out for their best interest and have it documented. It should also include your short and long-term goals for the client with any potential homework or exercises they should be doing. *Now that you know what SOAP notes are and why you need them...* **Download your free massage therapy SOAP note form to start recording better client notes for a better client experience!**
--- ## **The next level of massage SOAP notes** SOAP notes are something that, as massage therapists, we use EVERY single day, and it’s important to have a SOAP note form that allows you to accurately add in your client’s medical history and store it for safekeeping and future reference. If you’re looking for the next level of simplicity, efficiency, and professionalism, consider using [MassageBook’s premium SOAP notes](https://www.massagebook.com/marketing/features/business/soap-notes/), which are included in every paid plan. Not only will you be able to click or tap through layers of an anatomical chart, but you’ll also be able to draw on it and place subjective and objective tags directly on it. Combine this with MassageBook’s ability to create full sentence descriptions of subjective and objective notes by only requiring the massage therapist to select from a few drop-down list items of descriptive terms (like “left”, “distal”, “tibialis”, “hypertonicity”), and your massage SOAP notes will practically write themselves. SOAP notes don’t need to be a pain in the tail to complete anymore! And what good are SOAP notes if they’re not immediately available to view or add to? No good at all! So that's why all SOAP notes in MassageBook are automatically linked to your clients (and their appointments on your schedule!). Busy day, and you can’t remember if you completed a massage SOAP note for each client? You’re covered on that front as well. MassageBook tracks who you haven’t written a SOAP note for and puts them in a nice clean list so you can make quick work of completing them. You can even copy your notes from their last session into the current SOAP note so you can simply make edits rather than having to start with a blank note. Fast, efficient, easy, and incredibly useful— especially when paired with a [digital intake form](https://www.massagebook.com/marketing/features/business/client-intake-forms/). Once you’ve used our massage intake form and SOAP notes solution, you’ll wonder how you ever got along without them! [Take a closer look at how MassageBook simplifies SOAP notes](https://www.massagebook.com/marketing/soap-notes/) --- **Not quite ready to join MassageBook? With our free massage therapy SOAP note form, you can still experience the benefits of digital SOAP notes today.**
