The Schroth Method for Scoliosis

 
The Schroth Method for scoliosis utilizes a three dimensional approach to elongate the trunk and correct imbalances of the spine. The goal is to develop the inner muscles of the rib cage in order to change the shape of the upper trunk and to correct any spinal abnormalities.

Developed by Katharina Schroth

The Schroth Method was originally developed by Katharina Schroth in Germany. The method uses customized exercises to return the body’s posture to a more natural position. It is standard treatment for scoliosis in many European countries, and is gaining trust and popularity in the United States.

Scoliosis Symptoms

Symptoms of Scoliosis vary. Pain does not always accompany scoliosis. As a result, scoliosis can present in a variety ways such as abnormal trunk lean, uneven rib cage/shoulders or even back pain. If you suspect scoliosis contact your primary care provider. Prior to Schroth treatment, an x-ray is needed as scoliosis can present differently externally due to overlying musculature and does not give us the full picture. So, knowing the bony anatomy allows us to monitor your progress and tailor your treatment to your specific curvature.

Treatment at Park Sports PT

Getting treatment at Park Sports PT means you are working with certified therapists trained in the Schroth Method. They are partners in your health and wellness. Your therapist will create a personalized plan just for you and your specific condition. Our treatment approach can treat scoliosis patients of all ages. It can also can be utilized to treat in all stages of scoliosis, including after surgery.

Throughout treatment, we look closely at the three-dimensional curve in the spine. We teach patients very specific ways to correct that curve or scoliosis posture. Once patients have recognized their corrected posture, we teach them breathing and muscle activation techniques to hold that correction. Essentially, we help train the motor neurons to sense when they’re in a corrected posture versus when they’re in their scoliosis posture.

The Schroth Method takes a lot of repetition and commitment from the patient to learn these techniques. That’s why home exercises are also recommend at least five days a week for a half hour each time.

Trial results show improved patient outcomes

Several trials have found that physical therapy scoliosis-specific exercises lead to improved patient outcomes. This includes less pain and improved muscular strength, muscular endurance and self-image. In one study, spinal deformity improved in 69 percent of patients who completed Schroth exercises. This compared to only 6 percent in patients who did not complete their exercises. The Schroth Method at Park Sports PT works.

Your Park Sports PT team will create a personalized plan and will help prepare you to work on your strength and posture at home. The result is long term care and a stronger and healthier body.

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If you or your child has any symptoms or have visited your primary care provider and are looking for treatment, contact us today to learn more. We are here to help.

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Physical Therapy for Marathon Runners in Brooklyn

Race day is approaching. You put months of training and during that time, in ideal world, there would be no lingering soreness, no twinges. Are you worried about some long-standing maladies caused by overtraining? Do you think that there were other factors like body inefficiencies or misalignments that led to soreness, pain, even injury during your race prep? In reality, most runners have some issues that vary in severity. The running pain spectrum is wide.

Sports and Orthopedic Physical Therapist is trained and equipped to help runners to avoid or recover from most running injuries. I listed some conditions we treat at Park Sports Physical Therapy in the order of their frequency:

  1. Anterior knee pain, or Patella Femoral Pain Syndrome is the most common one, in some studies it was reported that it constitutes close to 40 percent of all running injuries. It is caused by biomechanical factors that increase load on the knee. Those factors are: excessive foot inward rolling (overpronation), weakness in quads and hip muscles, hip rotational deformity and disproportional stride lengths.
  2. Achilles tendinitis most common in runners over age 30. It is most commonly caused by high or low arches, tight hip flexors, weak trunk. These factors lead to overtraining  that contribute to the tendon inflammation.Plantar fasciitis is often caused by the same factors that contribute to Achilles tendinitis. Some studies showed that it is correlated to the lower back pain.
  3. Less common are Illiotibial Band Syndrome, Shin splints and Metatarsal Stress Fractures.

Physical Therapist can help you to become a smarter and stronger runner by evaluating your functional mobility and movement patterns. We can help you design a specific exercises and stretches to address those issues.

Sports Medicine Treatment in Brooklyn

Our Physical therapists are sports medicine specialists capable of effectively treating any sports-related injury.

If you’re an athlete and you experience an injury while playing your sport, you’re probably looking for sports medicine treatment in Brooklyn. Regardless of the type of injury or the sport in which it occurred, though, the best option in every case is to see a physical therapist as soon as possible. This is because physical therapists are sports medicine specialists who are experts at diagnosing and treating any and all sports-related injuries.

Sports medicine is a branch of health care that deals with the physical fitness of both amateur and professional athletes.  Sports therapy specialists focus on helping these athletes improve their athletic performance, and most importantly, treating their injuries and reducing the risk for future injuries that can be prevented.

Physical Therapists Play a Central Role in Sports Medicine Treatment

A sports medicine team includes physical therapists, physicians, surgeons, athletic trainers, coaches and athletes, who all work together to keep injury risk at a minimum and to effectively treat injuries when they do occur. Physical therapists play a central role in this team by being the most commonly used method to rehabilitate the majority of injuries in just about every sport.

For this reason, physical therapists are well versed in which types of injuries occur most frequently in each sport, and they are experienced in identifying and properly treating a vast range of sport-specific injuries.  For example, they know to look for the following injuries in each of these sports:

  • Basketball: ankle sprains, jumper’s knee, ACL injuries
  • Baseball: shoulder and elbow injuries, especially damage and tears of the ulnar collateral ligament
  • Football: concussions, ACL and meniscus injuries, ankle sprains
  • Tennis: tennis elbow, rotator cuff and other shoulder injuries
  • Running: runner’s knee, jumper’s knee, plantar fasciitis, Achilles tendinitis

So when an athlete sees a physical therapist with an injury, the therapist will know exactly what to look for in order to accurately diagnose the problem. From there, they will develop a personalized and sport-specific treatment program that takes into consideration the demands of the sport in order to reach the best possible outcome.

To highlight the effectiveness of physical therapists as sports medicine specialists, this recent study shows how physical therapy is better than injections for tennis elbow:

Physiotherapy was a cost-effective treatment for lateral epicondylalgia. Corticosteroid injection was associated with greater variability, and a lower probability of being cost-effective if a willingness to pay threshold of $A50 000 is assumed. A combination of corticosteroid injection and physiotherapy was ineffective and cost-ineffective. Physiotherapy, not corticosteroid injection, should be considered as a first-line intervention for lateral epicondylalgia.

So if you’re dealing with any type of sports injury, remember that physical therapy should always be your first choice for treatment, and the sooner you see a therapist, the greater the chances of a positive outcome. Click here to see where we are located (we have 4 locations to serve you).

Back Pain Treatment in Brooklyn

No matter what’s causing your non-specific back pain, our physical therapist will figure out the best way to address it. So, if you are searching for back pain treatment in Brooklyn, we encourage you to read the rest of this post to learn how we can help.

Back Pain Treatment in Brooklyn is Something That Thousands will Need

Back pain is extremely common. Approximately 80% of Americans will experience it in some capacity at least once in their lives. In the majority of these cases, the pain is centered in the lower back and is nonspecific, meaning no primary cause has been identified and its not known what originally led to the pain.

Low back pain (LBP) is most prevalent in those between the ages of 30-60, partially due to the aging process but also from a tendency to sit more and not get enough exercise during those years. Though some cases of LBP may come and go, up to 10% of people eventually develop chronic LBP, meaning it lasts for more than three months and is therefore a much more serious concern.

Aside from nonspecific low back pain, there are a number of other conditions that can lead to back pain. These include a herniated or ruptured disc, lumbar spinal stenosis, degenerative disc disease, sciatica, osteoarthritis, spondylolysis, spondylolisthesis and injuries like a pulled muscle or ligament. Regardless of its cause, LBP will usually result in difficulty performing daily activities that require any bending of the spine, as well as trouble exercising or playing certain sports. For some people, LBP can get so bad that they might not be able to perform their job and will miss work as a result.

Physical Therapy is a Clinically Proven Solution

Fortunately, physical therapy is a solution that will result in less pain for the majority of patients with LBP. Since it’s such a common condition, physical therapists frequently see LBP patients and have refined their treatment methods so they focus exclusively on what’s been found to work. Each physical therapy program will differ depending on the patient and what’s causing the pain, but most programs will consist of the following:

  • Stretching exercises
  • Strengthening exercises
  • Manual (hands-on) therapy performed by the therapist
  • Education on how to prevent future back pain
  • Functional training

There is an abundance of research on various treatments for LBP, with many showing mixed results. But new studies continue to emerge that support physical therapy as a beneficial treatment for LBP. Julie Fritz, PhD, PT, a leading physical therapist and clinical researcher summed it up best when she stated:

Many patients when they arrive at a doctor’s office complaining of low-back pain just need to hear that nothing is permanently wrong and the pain will most likely go away with time. But some patients will want more help. “That’s when physical therapy can play its most important role,”

Reference:

  1. Physical Therapy May Work for Back Pain, But Time Works Best

So if LBP is impacting your life in a negative way and you haven’t yet seen one of our physical therapists for treatment, now would be a good time to give it a try. We are confident that you won’t be disappointed in the results. Click here to learn how to contact us at one of our four offices.

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Knee Acupuncture in Clinton Hill

Did you search for acupuncture in Clinton Hill? Acupuncture can be helpful for managing your knee arthritis symptoms.

In our last blog, we explained what acupuncture is and how it can be used to address a wide variety of painful conditions throughout the body.  When a physical therapist considers it to be appropriate, they will recommend that acupuncture be combined with several other interventions, with the goal of bringing about the greatest benefits for each patient.  One group of patients that may stand to improve from a course of acupuncture is those who have knee osteoarthritis.

Osteoarthritis (OA), sometimes called wear-and-tear arthritis, is a condition in which the natural cushioning between joints—cartilage—gradually wears away.  Over time, this causes the bones of these joints to rub more closely against one another because there is less shock-absorbing cartilage.  Once this happens, individuals with knee OA will begin to experience symptoms like pain, stiffness, swelling, a feeling of warmth and a decreased ability to move the knees normally.

OA is the most common form of arthritis, and although it can occur in any joint in the body, it’s seen more often in the hips and knees than anywhere else.  Knee OA can also occur at any age, but the risk for developing it increases with older age because the body loses its ability to heal the damaged cartilage.  This is why about 10% of men and 13% of women over the age of 60 have knee OA.  Being obese or overweight also increases the chances of developing knee OA, since the additional weight puts added pressure on the knees and accelerates the damage to cartilage.

Unfortunately, there is no cure for knee OA, but treatments like physical therapy can be used to reduce symptoms and help patients function better in their everyday lives.  In some cases, a physical therapist might find it appropriate to combine physical therapy interventions like stretching and strengthening exercises with acupuncture.  Many studies have pointed out the various benefits of acupuncture for alleviating painful symptoms, and the same goes for knee OA.  According to a study from 2013:

As a summary of the current available research, acupuncture can be considered one of the more effective physical treatments for alleviating knee OA pain in the short-term.

So if you’re dealing with knee OA, a treatment program combining acupuncture with or without physical therapy may be the right approach for your condition.  Our expertly trained clinicians can perform a full-scale evaluation and determine what’s best for you, so that you can start moving without pain once again.

Click here for our contact information.  We have a clinic right here in Clinton Hill for you.

Acupuncture in Bedford Stuyvesant – a Good Choice for Neck Pain

Are you looking for acupuncture in Bedford Stuyvesant? If other treatments fail to reduce your neck pain, you may want to consider acupuncture.

If you’ve been following our past two blogs, by now you should be aware of just how effective acupuncture can be for patients who are in pain.  Neck pain is one of the most prevalent of all painful conditions, and there’s a strong that chance you have personally dealt with it at some point. As you might expect, acupuncture may once again provide the solution to this problem, especially for patients who don’t respond to other treatments.

Neck pain is considered the third most common cause of long lasting (chronic) pain after back pain and headaches.  At any given point in time, about 12% of adult females and 9% of adult males are dealing with neck pain, and its overall prevalence in today’s working population is approximately 45%.

Most cases of neck pain result from a muscle strain or sprain in the neck or areas that support it, although other issues may also be responsible.  Some of the most common causes of neck pain include sleeping on your neck wrong, sitting or standing for prolonged periods with bad posture, spending too much time performing repetitive movements, and carrying a heavy backpack, purse or briefcase.  Neck pain can also develop from conditions like osteoarthritis, a herniated disc or spinal stenosis, or from sudden injuries that may cause whiplash or other problems in the neck.

People with this condition most commonly experience pain that often gets worse from holding the head in place or lifting it for long periods, muscle tightness and spasms, a decreased ability to move rotate the neck, and headaches.  For some people, neck pain is also accompanied by upper back or shoulder pain, and pain in the shoulder may actually be referred from the neck.

There are numerous treatments available for neck pain, but some patients have tried many of them and still don’t improve.  This is where acupuncture comes in.  As with other conditions, a physical therapist may suggest trying acupuncture combined with physical therapy for patients that fail to get better with other treatments.  Many studies have shown that acupuncture is in fact effective for various conditions that cause neck pain, like whiplash, ankylosing spondylosis and cervical spondylosis.  In one recent study, researchers concluded:

Patients in the abdominal acupuncture group also exhibited significantly greater improvements in intensity of neck pain and a few quality-of-life measures than those in the sham abdominal acupuncture group, without any serious adverse events.

CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that abdominal acupuncture is an effective alternative treatment for neck pain.

While there’s no guarantee that acupuncture is necessarily right for you, this study and many others show that it is certainly beneficial for many patients.

So if you’re dealing with nagging neck pain that just won’t seem to subside, call or come by and ask our acupuncturist if this treatment is right treatment for you.

Click here for contact information for any of our practices.

 

 

Acupuncture Fort Greene – We Offer a Holistic Approach

Did you do a search for acupuncture Fort Greene?  If so, please read about our integrated treatment approach that is successful with so many of our patients.  Working together, we can provide you with a better treatment result and acupuncture just may be what you need.

Acupuncture is a professional service that can help you recover from a variety of painful conditions.

Every time a patient enters a clinic, the job of every physical therapist is to accurately diagnose their condition and determine the best course of treatment to help them improve.  While this usually focuses on various exercises and movement-based treatments performed by the therapist or patient, in some cases other interventions may be needed as well, like acupuncture.

One of the advantages of receiving treatment here a Park Sports Physical Therapy is that we provide an integrated approach to the treatment of our patients.  If a patient requests or needs acupuncture, we can bring in one of our licensed acupuncturists to help right away.

Why Acupuncture?

Acupuncture is an ancient therapy that originated in China more than 3,000 years ago and was introduced to the U.S. in the 1970s. Since then, acupuncture has become quite popular, as more than 14 million Americans have tried it by now.  Many of these individuals do so after other treatments and therapies have failed, especially individuals with chronic (long-lasting) pain.  Chronic pain is one of the many ailments acupuncture has been found to be effective for, while others includes headaches, tennis elbow, osteoarthritis, carpal tunnel syndrome, low back pain, and strains and sprains.

So, how does acupuncture actually work? Here’s a brief summary:

  • According to Chinese traditional medicine, there are more than 2,000 acupuncture points throughout the body, through which energy (or “chi”) must pass through freely for good health; disruptions in chi lead to illness
  • These acupuncture points connect with 20 meridian points, or pathways, which help conduct the chi throughout the body
  • The meridian points happen to coincide with trigger points, which are spots on the body where pain radiates away from the center of when pressed
  • During a session, a trained acupuncturist will insert anywhere from 1-20 hair-thin needles into these points for 15-30 minutes, in efforts to correct or maintain the normal flow of chi and address the imbalances in the body
  • In addition, acupuncture has been found to affect other systems of the body; it may release hormones and pain-killing chemicals called endorphins, and help cells from the immune system fight infection and inflammation

Perhaps the biggest reason acupuncture has grown in popularity is that so many patients experience benefits from it, which is also reflected in the research conducted on the topic.  According to one recent study:

Acupuncture is effective, safe, and cost-effective for treating several chronic pain conditions when performed by well-trained healthcare professionals.

Acupuncture is not for everyone.  The advantage of working with our experienced clinicians is that we can offer you the option if you are interested or if we feel it will be of benefit to you.  If you have a long-term issue that’s not responding to other therapies, it may be worth considering.  Rather than doing a search for acupuncture Fort Greene again, please consider contacting us.  We have an excellent reputation and would like to show you how we can help.

Contact us today for more information about acupuncture and to decide if it’s right for your condition.

 

 

Hand Therapy in Bedford Stuyvesant

If using your hands is causing you pain, then we provide some of the best hand therapy in Bedford Stuyvesant.

Regardless of what you typically do throughout the course of an average day, you are probably using your hands on a nearly constant basis.  Our hands are one of the main ways in which we interact with the world around us to get things done, and we rely on them heavily every day.

For this reason, if it becomes painful to move your hands or any body part related to the hands—like the wrist, forearm, elbow or shoulder—functioning in our daily lives can become extremely difficult.  Whether it’s an injury, an accident or a progressive condition, there are many problems that can lead to pain in the hands and surrounding area.  But whatever the cause of the pain, hand therapy is the best possible way to address the issue and help you to function normally once again.

A hand therapist is an occupational or physical therapist that specializes in treating a wide variety of injuries and conditions of the upper extremity, which includes the shoulder, elbow, forearm, wrist and hand.  Through extensive schooling and training, hand therapists are equipped to evaluate and treat these conditions with a number of different techniques.  The overall goal of treatment is to reduce pain, improve each patient’s function and help them return to their job or sport if the condition is holding them back.

Hand therapists are capable of managing just about any injury or condition that affects the upper extremity, or to bring patients back to full strength after surgery.  Some of the most common problems they treat include:

  • sprains and strains,
  • dislocations,
  • fractures,
  • carpal tunnel syndrome,
  • arthritis,
  • trigger finger,
  • sports injuries,
  • tendinitis, and
  • joint replacement surgery.

Treatment programs for each patient will depend on the type and location of their injury, as well as their specific overall goals.  In all cases, hand therapists will focus on helping the patient avoid surgery with the most appropriate treatments available.  This may include some of the following components:

  • Pain-relieving treatments like ice, heat and ultrasound
  • Stretching exercises
  • Strengthening exercises
  • Custom-made orthotics
  • Manual therapy applied to the injured area
  • Advice on how to modify daily activities to reduce further injury

Through the use of these and many other interventions, hand therapists will work closely with each patient and monitor their progress until they have recovered completely.  So if you’re dealing with any problems related to your hands, you should see one of our hand therapists right away.  It’s the safest and most effective way to regain your hand function and help you return to an easier daily life.

In any of our four offices we provide:

  • Hand Therapy in Clinton Hill,
  • Hand Therapy in Park Slope,
  • Hand Therapy in Fort Green,
  • Hand Therapy in Bedford Stuyvesant

Please call us today if you need a hand therapist to help you with your rehabilitation and recovery.

Click here for our office locations and contact information.

Scoliosis Specialist in Brooklyn

Scoliosis affects 2-3% of the American population. The most common form being idiopathic scoliosis which affects children ranging from ages 10-15 years old. Idiopathic means the causes are unknown. It is typically detected by school screenings or a physician visit. Patients with idiopathic scoliosis rarely experience pain and the curve is usually minor enough that treatment isn’t needed, but this can change with time. If your child has scoliosis our certified Schroth therapists can help treat and teach your child how to counteract the imbalances caused from the abnormal curvature of the spine.

In this article, Park Sports founder and physical therapist Boris Gilzon, PT DPT, OCS, CHT describes how our therapists utilize conservative methods such as breathing techniques, exercise, and body awareness to address Scoliosis and Kyphosis.

Originally developed in Germany by Katharina Schroth in the early 1920’s, the Schroth method has become one of the most effective and safest approaches to treating Scoliosis.

The Schroth method focuses heavily on rotational breathing, stabilizing and balancing the spine, chest expansion, derotation and reduction of the spine’s irregular curvature, elongation of the spine, hands-on treatment to correct the body’s posture, and educating the patient on exercises and techniques they could use for life.

There are numerous Schroth Method exercise. The combination of exercises our physical therapists prescribe is based on each patient’s body and the curves of their spine.

Unlike most other exercises, which are completed on both sides of the body, scoliosis exercises are generally executed on one side only. This is in order to correct the imbalances of the spine by lengthening and strengthening the muscles in this area.

On the whole, the exercises consist of a combination of stretching, strengthening and breathing techniques, which follow this three-step exercise process:

  1. First, make sure the pelvis is properly aligned
  2. Then, do exercises to lengthen the spine, followed by breathing techniques to move the spine and ribs into the best possible posture
  3. Finally, tense the muscles of the trunk, which will strengthen weak muscles and preserve the posture that has now been corrected

The benefits of the Schroth Method are highlighted in the findings of this recent study:

According to these results, Schroth PSSE (physiotherapeutic scoliosis-specific exercises) added to the standard of care were superior compared to standard of care alone for reducing the curve severity in patients with AIS (adolescent idiopathic scoliosis). Reference: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5198985/

So if you or your child are dealing with scoliosis, the Schroth Method may be your best option to address its symptoms and prevent the condition from progressing further.

Do you or your child suffer from scoliosis or kyphosis? We can help. Schedule your evaluation today.

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Running Injury Specialist in Brooklyn and the AlterG

A running injury specialist in Brooklyn isn’t easy to find.  Fortunately, you’ve come to the right place.

As we mentioned in our last post, running injuries are common and it’s important to see a healthcare provider that specializes in running injury evaluation and treatment and understands the challenges and demands of distance runners.  Click here to review that post.

One of Our Secret Weapons to Optimize Running Injury Recovery

Our AlterG Anti-Gravity Treadmill can help elevate your physical therapy treatment program to a new level.

When you’re recovering from an injury (especially a running injury), the force of gravity actually works against you during this process, whether you realize it or not.  In our normal environment, gravitational forces move through the body from the foot and ankle, to the knee, the hips, and the trunk.  If these forces are too much for the injured soft tissue, they can cause repetitive stress disorders and slow the recovery process.  But what if gravity could be reduced or nearly eliminated from this equation?

The AlterG Anti-Gravity Treadmill is essentially the answer to this question.  Using technology developed by NASA to allow astronauts to exercise in space, this treadmill was created to help patients recover from their injury or condition more efficiently in an environment in which the amount of gravity can be controlled.  The AlterG Anti-Gravity Treadmill can be added to many different physical therapy treatment programs, and at Park Sports Physical Therapy, it has been working wonders in helping many patients to improve more quickly.

Here’s How Limited Gravity can Help Get You Back to Running Faster

Here’s how it works: patients wear a special device on their waist and then step onto the treadmill.  When they’re ready, an air chamber is then inflated, and the seal is secured to their waist device with a zipper.  Once inflated, the gravity in the air chamber can be adjusted from as low as 20% to 100% of the patient’s normal body weight.  This allows them to walk or run with a feeling of weightlessness that many patients say feels like “walking on the moon.”

By offering this ability to patients like distance runners, the AlterG Anti-Gravity Treadmill can be used in a physical therapy treatment program for just about any injury or condition of the lower body, as well as for those who are overweight.  Here are just a few of the many diagnoses the treadmill is used for:

  • Foot fracture
  • Ankle sprain or tear
  • Stress fracture
  • Plantar fasciitis or plantar fascia tear
  • Knee or hip osteoarthritis
  • Knee or hip replacement recovery

Case Study – Chronic Knee Pain in a Runner

The AlterG Anti-Gravity Treadmill, cutting edge physical therapy equipment, was utilized early in the rehab process in order to restore normal gait and running mechanics.  The patient had excellent carry over from AlterG training and was able to demonstrate normal gait and running mechanics outdoors on level ground at the end of the treatment session. By the end of week 5, the patient was able to achieve normal gait and running mechanics on level ground without warm-up or training on the AlterG. The patient continued to progress running for endurance training on level ground as part of home exercise program.

The patient was able to achieve all her goals and return to full time competitive level cheerleading without symptoms.
Reference: https://www.alterg.com/case-study/chronic-patellofemoral-pain

Numerous other case studies found on the AlterG website, have shown that the AlterG Anti-Gravity Treadmill is effective for treating a number of problems by increasing strength, flexibility and fitness levels.  So if you’re dealing with any sort of lower body injury, find out how a physical therapy treatment program with this treadmill can help you next.

Call us today if you are looking for a running injury specialist in Brooklyn. Click here to visit our contact page.