Wearable Reduces ACL Injuries in Female Study Subjects

Published on July 11, 2016

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Technology may offer a way to control the significantly higher occurrences of ACL injury among young women who play soccer. A new report shows that using a wearable neuromuscular (WNM) as part of a training protocol helped substantially reduce ACL injuries in recent testing.

According to the study, presented recently at the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine’s (AOSSM) Annual Meeting in Colorado Springs, Colo, athletes who used the devices in combination with a regular training program showed functional improvements.

“Our study showed that training with a wearable neuromuscular (WNM) device improved postural control in athletes, without limiting performance,” says Michael John Decker, PhD, from the University of Denver in Denver, in a media release from AOSSM. “Moreover, no athletes in the study experienced an ACL injury during training or over the course of the following season.”

In the study involving 79 elite youth and collegiate female soccer players (ages 12 to 25), participants trained with a WNM device that applied bilateral, topical pressure to the medial quadriceps and hamstring muscles. The preseason training program with the device lasted 7 to 9 weeks, and consisted of strength and conditioning exercises and on-field team practices.

“Research has shown female soccer players have a three times greater risk of ACL injury compared to males, yet only a small portion of soccer coaches are currently utilizing ACL injury risk reduction programs,” Decker states in the release. “We hope these devices offer coaches a practical means to overcome participation barriers, opening the door for more organizations and teams to implement similar programs.”

[Source(s): American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine, Science Daily]

Can new devices match Heimlich to stop choking?

Published July 13, 2016

The Wall Street Journal

The Ache: Nearly 5,000 people a year die from choking in the U.S., according to the nonprofit National Safety Council.

The Claim: Two new easy-to-use devices work like plungers to suck out obstructions in the airway, providing another option if standard treatment—such as abdominal thrusts developed in 1974 by Henry Heimlich—fail to clear the airway, say the companies who sell them.

The Verdict: A recently published laboratory study showed the LifeVac, from LifeVac LLC of Springfield Gardens, N.Y., dislodged simulated obstructions. So far there haven’t been any scientific publications detailing lives saved with the LifeVac or another device, from Dechoker LLC, of Salisbury, N.C.

More on this...

96-year-old Heimlich uses namesake maneuver on choking woman

Autistic NYC boy says 'SpongeBob' taught him Heimlich

The ubiquitous choking poster gets a makeover

Both the Dechoker, $89.95, and the LifeVac, $69.95, have a plastic mask that provides a seal over the mouth and nose while suction is provided. The Dechoker looks like a large syringe, while the LifeVac’s plunger is shaped like a small accordion. In both devices, one-way valves allow air to only travel out of the mask and not into it, which avoids pushing the object deeper in, says LifeVac Chief Executive Arthur Lih.

Common Misconceptions about Physical Therapy

You Can Choose! It is a common misconception that you have to go where your doctor refers you. In Kentucky you do not have to obtain a referral to see a Physical Therapist, but there are some insurance plans that require you to have such. However, you are still able to go to a facility of your choice. Bluegrass Doctors of Physical Therapy receives the majority of our patient referrals from Friends & Family spreading the word. Not all physicians refer based on where they think you will get the best care, there may be other reasons for why they send you to a certain clinic. Take the time to do your research. We have many local community physicians that refer to us as well our past & current patients. If we are not the best clinic to receive treatment from for your condition we will be sure to refer you to a specialty clinic that is. Now that's real care!

Hospitals cost you more! Often times physicians will refer a patient to a hospital or physician owned therapy practice. What they don't tell you is that this often cost the patient more. Hospitals and physician owned practices often have higher negotiated rates with insurance companies than private practices typical do, and that means the higher the rate the more you pay.

In-Network Providers are not always best! Most insurance companies require providers to drastically reduce their rates in order to join the insurance companies network or be considered an In-Network provider. Lowering fees means that the providers have to find creative ways to keep quality up but at the same time keep treatments affordable for the business which can be difficult. We currently have patients who have most major insurances but refuse to allow those insurance companies to dictate the care our patients receive. so if it will not financially allow us to provide our patients with the best care we can offer. Our patients getting well is our number one priority and we will do all we can to continue to offer that care while remaining affordable.

Don't Just Trust Your Body To Anyone, or Your Recovery!

Not all Providers are the same. In fact many professionals that are not even licensed in physical therapy say they offer physical therapy services. These providers usually will just offer exercises without even looking at what may be CAUSING your pain or condition. Physical Therapists are specialist in movement and the neuro-musculoskeletal system, meaning they are experts in how all of the components of your nerves, muscles and bones interact with each other and how they may cause dysfunction and pain. This is why it can be very disadvantageous to receive services from someone that does not specialize in physical therapy or from a physical therapist that does not specialize in your specific condition. With many surgical repairs there is a small window of opportunity for optimal recovery and if you are not receiving top notch care during that time frame it can negatively affect the recovery permanently. Some important questions to ask when choosing a therapist would be:

1.) What type of patients or cases do you see most?

2.) Am I going to receive one-on-one care?

3.) Are you familiar with my condition and symptoms?

Don't let your provider eat up your visits!

Depending on your rehabilitation needs some episodes will take just a few visits to recover while others will require an extended amount. However, there is typically a norm for how many visits it will take to recover. If you feel that you are not seeing much improvement it never hurts to obtain a second opinion. Often times, people wait until all of their yearly visits have been used up or they have utilized all of their funds before they realize the provider they were seeing may not have been the best provider for that particular case.

At Bluegrass Doctors of Physical Therapy our mission is to provide you with excellent care and fast results. We recognize everyone is different and that is why on your first visit we will perform a thorough evaluation with you to find out what is causing your specific issue and design an unique treatment plan based off of your specific needs and goals for your therapy. And as always treatment starts DAY ONE!

Kind Regards,

Dr Patrick Bray PT, DPT, NSCA-CPT, Cert-SMT, CMTPT, FAAOMPT, Adv CI

Just a quick blog to wish everyone a HAPPY NEW YEAR and of course a HEALTHY NEW YEAR! 2015 was such a roller coaster eh? 

I wanted to just drop a thought and let all my New Year Resolutionist in a small tidbit before they go running a marathon or joining the crossfit gym across the street. Just remember to begin slow and methodically increase your intensity over time. Often times we go "gung ho" into something new because...well...its NEW and its EXCITING. But we often end up with injuries as a result. I am always here if that happens, however an ouce of prevention is TOTALLY worth a POUND of cure. 

If anyone who reads this wishes to have a consult PRIOR to starting a fitness regimen please don't heistate to contact us. I will even give you 10% off the price if you mention this article! 

Heres to a New Year and a Heathier YOU! 

When pain is predictably provoked by mechanical stress, and eased by its alleviation, we quickly implicate a mechanical, or at least peripheral, nociceptive mechanism, and apply diagnoses like mechanical low-back pain that justify our favoured peripherally directed interventions. While the logic is attractive, what if central processes could mediate this presentation? Centrally mediated pain masquerading as peripheral.

We recently investigated the idea of centrally-mediated mechanical symptoms (Harvie et. al 2015 PDF). The study involved twenty-four people with the type of persistent neck pain problems seen in everyday practice, and all with pain on rotation. They performed head rotation to their first onset of pain (P1), in three virtual-reality conditions where the amount of rotation that they saw did not match reality. Instead, the viewed rotation was more or less than was actually occurring, creating an illusion of movement that was different to actual movement. Remarkably, pain with movement depended not only on how far people actually moved, but how far it appeared they had moved (see figure and explanation in caption below).

Mean (circle) and 95% confidence interval (error bars) for the range of motion to first onset of pain presented as a proportion of the mean range of rotation for the neutral condition. When the visual feedback suggested less movement, the first onset of pain (P1) was delayed by 6%, when the visual feedback suggested more movement, P1 7% sooner.

That pain with movement can be reliably modulated by the (visual) suggestion of more or less movement (i.e. by a non-mechanical input) is significant, and prompts us to reconsider the mechanical presentation.

In the past, perceptions such as pain were simply considered a read-out of incoming information. However, it has become clear that we could not make sense of the world if sensory information was not first filtered and arranged by our subconscious. In the case of visual perception, for example, the infinite array of colours, edges and shapes are arranged by our subconscious into the meaningful objects that we see and understand. Certain rules seem to govern this process — such as the way objects are arranged according to continuity of lines, colour and motion. The rules that govern the construction of pain, while only recently receiving attention, appear to involve the brains analysis of information relating to bodily danger. Nociception is the most obvious signal of danger to the body — but not the only one. Specific movements for example, might also become signals of bodily danger because of their meaning derived from association with injury. This would explain how (visual) signals of movement may have come to be a contributor to pain in these people with neck pain.

While ample research supports the idea that signals of threat influence pain, this study suggests specifically that information about the body in space (whether visual, proprioceptive or vestibular) that has been associated with an injury, might be relevant signals of threat. Indeed their influence may even result in a clinical pattern that appears mechanical, but is in fact centrally driven.

The treatment of threatening pain-associations is an ongoing field of study. In the meantime I think that there are a few things we can do to better align clinical practice with the threat-based understanding of pain that this finding aligns with. Firstly, we can expand our minds and clinical assessments to identify both nociceptive and non-nociceptive sources of threat (guaranteed we wont treat something we don’t assess!). Secondly, we can leverage our skills in education and behaviour therapy to encourage thoughts and actions that counter threat.