Tag: stress

Master Sagittal Plane, Coaching Progressions, Detaching, & TFL Inhibition – Movement Debrief Episode 5

Did you miss Movement Debrief live yesterday? Though much more fun live, I have a video of what we discussed below. This debrief was quite fun, as we had an impromptu viewer q&a. Thank you Alan Luzietti for the awesome questions! If you follow along live on Facebook or Youtube, I will do my best to answer any questions you ask. Yesterday we discussed the following topics: Why you should emphasize sagittal plane activities longer than you think How to coach exercises to maximize client learning and compliance Why detaching from your client encounters makes you a better clinician Viewer Q&A – “centering from the chaos” & TFL Inhibition Lastly, if you want the acute:chronic workload calculator I spoke about, click here. Without further ado: Master Sagittal Plane Coaching Progressions Detaching Refocusing TFL Inhibition

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Course Notes: BSMPG 2015

#Bestconferenceevaahhhhh I shipped off to Boston to attend my first ever BSMPG summer symposium. And it was easily one of the best conferences I’ve ever been to. There was an excellent speaker lineup and so much of my family. Art Horne really put on a fantastic show. If you haven’t been to BSMPG before, put it on your to-course list. It is one of the few courses that has a perfect combination of learning and socializing. I hope to not miss another. Instead of my usual this person talked about that, let’s look at some of the big pearls from the weekend.   Why Sapolsky Doesn’t Get Ulcers In one quote Robert Sapolsky summed up my current foundational premise to rehabilitation and training: “The stress response returns the body to homeostasis after actual or potential threats.” ~ Robert Sapolsky   Regardless of what your malady is, it can probably be linked back to the stress response gone awry. The specifics become irrelevant because the stress response occurs nonspecifically. This response works best against acute crises. Guess how we screw it up? Chronic stressors. Human stressors are quite different from other species’ as we have the capability of inducing this stress response psychosocially. Gazelles on the Serengeti don’t have to worry about student loans.   We can see how chronic stress becomes an issue when you look at what occurs in the stress response: Glucose travels to the bloodstream to mobilize energy. Increased cardiovascular tone, heart rate, and blood pressure. Decrease long-term building projects such as

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It’s the Salient Detection System, Stupid

 Can you tell the difference among pain, depression, and pleasure? From a neurotransmitter perspective, the answer is no (see here and here). How is it that three very different states can be so neurologically similar? I feel the commonality that the nervous system purports reflects a system that responds to stimuli that are deviations from the norm. We call these instances by this word: Salient. Doesn’t that make your loins quiver? Let’s discuss how it works. Here’s your recommended reading. 1. The pain matrix reloaded: a salience detection system for the body (Thanks Sigurd) 2. Stress signalling pathways that impair prefrontal cortex structure and function (Thanks Son) 3. From the neuromatrix to the pain matrix (and back) [Note: Most of this article is an amalgamation of the three articles that I cited above and my own thoughts. Rather then cite every sentence AMA-style, I’ll give the credit to these guys above. Read ‘em and figure out how I put this together. For those who are sticklers for proper reference formatting, the type I am using is KMA-style citation.*] The Pain Neuromatrix Myth Hate to break it to you, but pain ain’t so special. Here’s why. If you follow modern pain science, you may often hear the term pain neurosignature or neurotag. This phrase is meant to describe a cluster of brain areas that are active during a pain experience. Information that can contribute to a pain experience travels to several areas. Some of the big players are the primary and secondary somatosensory cortices (all the

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The End of Pain

I’m Done Treating Pain. Yes. You read that correctly. I’m over it. Several different thoughts have crept into to my mind sparked by what I have read and conversations I have had. I would like to share these insights with you. I remember when I was visiting Bill Hartman Dad a few months ago and we were talking about a specific treatment that is quite controversial in therapy today. He said something that really resonated with me: “Maybe they measured the wrong thing.” This sentiment was echoed in “Topical Issues in Pain 1” by Louis Gifford. Check out this fantastic excerpt: “Thus, pain can be viewed as a single perceptual component of the stress response whose prime adaptive purpose is to powerfully motivate the organism to alter behavior in order to aid recovery and survive.” Notice what I bolded there. Pain is a single component of the stress response. Not the stress response. Not a necessary component of the stress response. Just one possibility. Why do we place so much importance on pain? Many proponents of modern pain science (myself included) often use this statement against individuals who are over-biomedically inclined: “Nociception is neither necessary nor sufficient for a pain experience.” Agreed, pain is not always the occurring output when nociception is present. That said, pain is only one of several outputs that may occur when a tissue is injured. Just because pain is absent does not mean other outputs are also absent. Many different outputs can occur when an individual is

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