Our Center specializes in the...

Physical Therapy Modalities

Among the foundations of our integrated approach to wellness are the fundamentals of traditional physical therapy.

• Ultrasound - The use of sound waves to produce movement and heat through our body soft tissues.
• Laser Light Therapy - The use of low level infrared light at varying frequencies to promote cellular metabolism.
• Electrical Stimulation - The use of electricity to enhance a stimulatory or inhibitory effect on the nerve/muscle relationship.
• Fulford Osteopathic Vibration Unit - The use of vibration through the skeletal system to enhance osseous healing and stability.
• Heat / Ice - The use of moist heat or ice to enhance circulation or decrease swelling before, during or after a treatment session.
• Education - The instruction in body mechanics, activities of daily living and home exercise programs that meet your individual needs.
• Traction - The use of mechanical traction to decrease spinal compression.

Medical Fitness

As exercise is an important consideration in all forms of rehabilitation, we add the expertise of fitness with your medical situation as your focus.

• Pilates - A movement technique and exercise method, which promotes core (stabilizing) strength of the trunk while producing long, lean musculature. This method focuses on optimal postural alignment and coordinated movements. The combined mental and physical processes result in a reconnection of brain to muscle pathways, which enhance the physical grace of movement.
  
• Feldenkrais - Of movement is based on principles of physics, biomechanics and human development. This dynamic method uses gentle movement and directed attention to re-educate the body and calm down the nervous system. Through the process of increased awareness, one learns to reduce extraneous effort and let go of habitual patterns in the body to allow for a clear sense of skeletal support, often leading to greater flexibility, coordination, balance, and posture. Not only does this method help prevent and recover from injuries, but it also assists in maintaining healthy joints and tissues.
  
• Nutrition - Individualized nutritional guidance is also part of our integrative and effective solutions for optimal health. Each of us are blessed with biochemical individuality. Though we share broad nutritional similarities, we are each physically, chemically and biologically unique and our dietary requirements differ. To promote balance, it is essential to select your diet from a variety of food sources. Our staff and other resources will guide you if nutritional counseling is necessary for your medical fitness.
  
• Organ fitness - If you have a visceral relationship to your illness, our program for organ fitness will encourage the internal health and homeostasis for your body. We combine visceral manipulation, breath work, awareness thru movement lessons, abdominal, thoracic or pelvic exercise specifically for the location of your organ dysfunction.

Manual Therapy

Growth and development beyond the foundations of our integrated approach to wellness is our exceptional training and skill in soft tissue manual therapies.

• Visceral Manipulation - At times, overuse of muscle groups, repetition of movement, injuries, strains or accidents can cause an internal pulling of organs and their attachments that create pain or discomfort in muscles, connective tissue or the skeletal structure. Using visceral (organ system) techniques, our therapists gently enhance the mobility and tissue movement of the organs, which decreases pain and promotes the body’s natural healing processes.
  
  Methods such as Visceral Manipulation have been part of the medicinal cultures in Europe and Asia since prerecorded times. Indeed, manual manipulation of the internal organs has long been a component of some therapeutic systems in Oriental medicine. So it’s no surprise that practitioners in many parts of the world have incorporated manipulations designed to work with the internal organs and their functions.
  
  The Visceral system relies on the interconnected synchronicity between the motions of all the organs and structures of the body. At optimal health, this harmonious relationship remains stable despite the body’s endless varieties of motion. But when one organ cannot move in harmony with its viscera due to abnormal tone, adhesions or displacement, it works against the body's other organs and muscular, membranous, fascial and osseous structures. This disharmony creates fixed, abnormal points of tension that the body is forced to move around. And that chronic irritation, in turn, paves the way for disease and dysfunction. Imagine an adhesion around the lungs. It would create a modified axis that demands abnormal accommodations from nearby body structures. For example, the adhesion could alter rib motion, which could then create imbalanced forces on the vertebral column and, with time, possibly develop a dysfunctional relationship with other structures. This scenario highlights just one of hundreds of possible ramifications of a small dysfunction- magnified by thousands of repetitions each day.
  
  Thanks to the dedicated work of Dr. Jean-Pierre Barral, an osteopathic physician and registered physical therapist, healthcare practitioners today can use the rhythmic motions of the visceral system as important therapeutic tools. Barral’s research and clinical work with the viscera led to his development of a form of manual therapy that focuses on the internal organs, their environment, and their potential influence on many structural and physiological dysfunctions. The term he coined for this therapy was Visceral Manipulation. Visceral Manipulation relies on the palpation of normal and abnormal forces within the body. By using specific techniques, therapists can evaluate how abnormal forces interplay, overlap and affect the normal body forces at work. The goal is to help the body’s normal forces remove abnormal affects, whatever their sources. Those effects can be global, encompassing many areas of bodily function.
  
• Craniosacral Therapy - This gentle therapy promotes the release of restrictions in the connective tissues that surround the brain and spinal cord. This light-touch therapy improves the central nervous system function, reducing the effects of stress and strengthens resistance to disease.
  
  The history of CranioSacral Therapy dates back to the early 1900s, when osteopathic physician William Sutherland was struck by the unusual idea that the bones of the skull were structured to allow for movement. For more than 20 years he explored this concept, eventually developing a system of examination and treatment known as Cranial Osteopathy. In 1970, Dr. John E. Upledger observed the rhythmic movement of the craniosacral system firsthand during surgery. Yet none of his colleagues nor any medical texts could explain his discovery. Two years later he attended a seminar that explained Sutherland’s ideas, as well as some of his evaluation and treatment techniques. Coupling a scientific background with tactile sensitivity, Dr. Upledger was quick to understand how a hydraulic system using cerebrospinal fluid might function inside a membranous sac encased within the skull and spinal canal. He incorporated and refined Dr. Sutherland’s techniques with success.
  
  While the validity of the cardiovascular and respiratory rhythms are undisputed today, for a long time the very existence of these systems sparked debate in medical communities around the globe. Now for nearly 25 years, osteopathic physician and researcher John E. Upledger, D.O., O.M.N., has been a proponent of using the rhythm of another body system- the craniosacral system- to enhance body functioning, and help alleviate pain and discomfort. The craniosacral system consists of the membranes and cerebrospinal fluid that surround and protect the brain and spinal chord. It extends from the bones of the skull, face and mouth, which make up the cranium, down to the sacrum, or tailbone area. Since this vital system influences the development and performance of the brain and spinal chord, an imbalance or restriction in it could potentially cause any number of sensory, motor or neurological disabilities. Craniosacral therapy is a gentle method of detection and correction that encourages your own natural healing mechanisms to dissipate these negative effects of stress on your central nervous system. You also benefit from better overall health and resistance to disease.
  
• Lymphatic Drainage - Lymphatic Drainage activates and cleanses the human fluid system to help the rhythm, pressure, quality and direction of lymph flow. The body can then naturally and more effectively filter out toxins and assist the body in healing itself. Many patients find a reduction in swelling and muscle and joint pain.
  
  The proper functioning of the lymphatic system is critical to our body’s ability to detoxify and regenerate tissues, filter out toxins and foreign substances, recover crucial substances that have escaped from the blood, and maintain a healthy immune system. It’s a complex system comprised primarily of lymph vessels and nodes working in cooperation to accomplish these tasks.
  
  Lymphatic Drainage is a hands-on technique designed to activate and cleanse the human fluid system. Its origins can be traced to two traditions in particular: the published research of Frederic Millard, a Canadian osteopathic physician (1922), and of Emil Vodder, a Danish massage practitioner and doctor of philosophy (1932). Over the years, methods based on the discoveries of these two pioneers have been honed, refined and expanded.
  
  Some of the benefits of Lymph Drainage Therapy include:
  
  
  • Reduction in edemas (swelling) and lymphedemas of many origins
  • Detoxification of the body
  • Regeneration of tissue, including burns, scars (pre- and post-surgical), wrinkles and stretch marks
  • Reduction in the symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia
  • Improvement of venous conditions
  • Relief of chronic and subacute inflammation, sinusitis, otitis, acne and allergies
  • Relief of chronic pain
  • Antispastic actions to relieve conditions such as muscle hypertonus and some forms of constipation
  • Deep relaxation to aid insomnia, stress, loss of vitality and loss of memory
  • Alleviation of adiposis and cellulite
• Mechanical Link - Developed in the late 1970's by French osteopath Paul Chauffour, Mechanical Link (ML) is a gentle manual therapy that encourages the balance of tensions in the fascial system- that complex web of tissue that interconnects and affects all other body systems. It spreads throughout the body uninterrupted, providing physical stability while also allowing flexibility and mobility. Think of the fascial network as a spider web. Imagine what happens if one area of the web is pinched or tightened: everything else distorts. The body compensates for physiological or traumatic stress in much the same way- by producing patterns of tension called lesions that affect the entire structure. These patterns are intended to relieve pain and disability and protect the body from further stresses. Yet the long-term effects of such compensation can prove debilitating.
  
  Over the years of research and clinical practice, Paul Chauffour found that a series of interrelated lesion types exist in the body. An original lesion can be caused by any significant stress element, such as injury, long-term illness or even a surgical scar. Secondary lesions form when the body compensates to accommodate for the original lesion. That process then forms a “chain” of lesions. The Mechanical Link practitioner seeks out the primary lesion of eight functional body systems. When the dominant lesion is effectively eliminated, the body is able to readjust itself as corresponding lesions down the chain self-correct.
  
  Once the core lesion is established, the practitioner performs a very gentle, hands-on corrective procedure that will allow the body tissues to release their restrictive patterns. Almost immediately, you should be able to feel the results of the treatment. At each subsequent visit, the practitioner assesses your posture, mobility and tension levels. This helps determine how the body is progressing when the presenting problems are resolved.
• Myofascial Release - Sometimes accidents, injuries or simply the overuse of muscles can cause muscle and surrounding connective tissue, or fascia, to become restricted causing pain and/or limited movement. This can cause chronic muscle or joint pain, spasms, or an internal misalignment of the internal body structures. Using a variety of gentle slow stretches, these indirect techniques correct long-standing tissue restrictions. The outcome is decreased pain and increased mobility.
  
• Muscle Energy Techniques - An exceptional therapeutic process which restores free and comfortable motion to a painful or restricted joint. The process uses a direct, three-dimensional movement approach of timed soft tissue contraction/relaxation, which inhibits restriction within the muscular skeletal system.
  
• Strain/Counter-strain - This indirect, soft tissue manual approach will reduce pain by decreasing “protective” muscle spasms.
  
• Joint Mobilization - A direct manual approach to mobilize the joint to increase range of movement.
  
• Soft Tissue Mobilization - A direct manual approach to elongate the fascial fibers that surround our muscles.
• Therapeutic Massage - Therapeutic massage therapy is based on scientific massage techniques that release patterns of pain in the body. Therapeutic (neuromuscular) and deep tissue massage can also reduce restrictions in the body and increase range of motion and fluid movement.