All About the Spine

How to maximize your spinal movement Movement Debrief Episode 118 is in the books. Below is a copy of the video for your viewing pleasure, and audio if you can’t stand looking at me. Here is the setlist: What happens to the thoracic spine and scapulae during inhalation? What compensatory strategy is present with a Dowager’s Hump? What treatments should one with a Dowager’s Hump focus on? What sitting posture is best? Should restoring sagittal plane motion allow for rotation to occur, or must you focus on rotation? When can the spine present with excessive lumbar flexion? What is the action of the lower trapezius on the spine? When could recruiting the lower trapezius be useful? Is the cat-cow exercise useful? How does a spinal fusion impact respiration?

Read More

All About the Ribcage

Learn how reaching and improve upper body mobility Movement Debrief Episode 117 is in the books. Below is a copy of the video for your viewing pleasure, and audio if you can’t stand looking at me. Here is the setlist: What order should I prioritize improving ribcage expansion? What is the manubriosternal joint? What happens when I have mixed compensations at the sternum? How can I encourage ribcage dynamics without increasing secondary compensations? What visual cues can I look at to see if someone can “stack?” What is different about infrasternal angle presentations between 90-110 degrees? How do I go about improving these particular infrasternal angle presentations? How can thoracic sidebending be useful with improving ribcage dynamics?

Read More

Introduction to Orofacial Myofunctional Therapy Course Review

How improving tongue mobility can impact sleep and nasal breathing I hit a plateau. I was getting good results with many clients. I was making infrasternal angles dynamic, restoring hip flexion and extension, and getting ribcage mobility on fleek. Yet there were still some folks who I couldn’t get the symptom change they needed. Either they had really stiff necks, craniofacial issues, or difficulty sleeping. I knew I was missing something. Then I found myofunctional therapy. My buddy Joe Cicinelli, my myofunctional therapist, gave me some tongue exercises surrounding my tongue-tie release surgery, and I noticed some interesting changes with myself. My neck felt looser, I was sleeping better, and just overall feeling better. I decided to experiment and try a few activities here and there on some clients. With having only a rudimentary understanding, I started seeing some of those troubling cases improve. Necks were less tight. Sleep was improving, jaw pain was vanishing. I needed to learn more. That’s when I came across the Academy of Orofacial Myofunctional Therapy (AOMT) and saw they offered an introductory course. I was in. Four days later, a gap was filled. Having applied these techniques to several patients, many of those troubled cases were not so troubling. Although I was addressing airway with most of my treatments, I neglected the uppermost portions of it. The folks at AOMT give you that and then some. With this course, we deep-dived into anatomy, evidence, assessment, treatment, and business. You really get a total package

Read More

Reaching: Theory and Practice

Learn how reaching and improve upper body mobility Movement Debrief Episode 116 is in the books. Below is a copy of the video for your viewing pleasure, and audio if you can’t stand looking at me. Here is the setlist: How does airflow change at various reaching angles? How does airflow change with trunk rotation? What is the scapular orientation during shoulder extension? How does one with a posterior thorax tilt present? How do different carry variations impact airflow?  How does forearm supination and pronation impact reaching? How can we sequence carries in a manner that allows for maximal airflow expansion? How can you tell if someone is using a compensatory strategy when they are lifting weights?

Read More

Infrasternal Angle Compensations and Treatments

A deep dive into the infrasternal angle Movement Debrief Episode 115 is in the books. Below is a copy of the video for your viewing pleasure, and audio if you can’t stand looking at me. Here is the setlist: What are the primary compensatory strategies with a wide and narrow infrasternal angle? What would be secondary compensations seen with these infrasternal angles? What test results would each infrasternal angle have? What exercises should be programmed for inhalation and exhalation strategies? What is the upper thorax presentation for each infrasternal angle? What exhalation strategies should each infrasternal angle use? Are there times it’s okay to deviate from these strategies?

Read More