Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Fix It With Your Hands: Reshaping Fascia for Pain Relief and Improved Function
    Fix It With Your Hands: Reshaping Fascia for Pain Relief and Improved Function
    Fix It With Your Hands: Reshaping Fascia for Pain Relief and Improved Function
    Ebook239 pages2 hours

    Fix It With Your Hands: Reshaping Fascia for Pain Relief and Improved Function

    By Nancy J. Johns

    1/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    This illustrated workbook is designed to help therapists learn how to use myofascial release successfully with their patients. It is not research oriented, but more of a sharing of experiences. It includes ways of looking at patients with a kinesiology perspective, and extensive, illustrated examples of different releases. It is designed to encourage the therapist to practice on their own to develop skill in this manual technique.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBookBaby
    Release dateDec 5, 2018
    ISBN9781543952148
    Fix It With Your Hands: Reshaping Fascia for Pain Relief and Improved Function

    Related to Fix It With Your Hands

    Related ebooks

    Medical For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Fascinating Fascia

      Aug 14, 2019

      Fascinating Fascia
      7 min read

    • Article

      Fascia, Psoas and Injury

      Apr 1, 2019

      Fascia, Psoas and Injury
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Missing Piece?

      Jun 11, 2018

      The Missing Piece?
      5 min read

    • Article

      Pressure POINTS

      Jul 25, 2021

      If you’re lying on a massage table worrying about not being a good massage recipient, you’re probably not doing it right. This is the thought that made me snort-laugh last week at a Rotorua spa, startling the masseur. It’s not that I’m a massage novi

      2 min read

    • Article

      Fascia For The Win

      Sep 21, 2017

      Fascia For The Win
      4 min read

    • Article

      Six Steps To PELVIC FLOOR Strength

      Oct 7, 2020

      Six Steps To PELVIC FLOOR Strength
      2 min read

    • Article

      Getting Off Your Nerves

      Jul 21, 2019

      Getting Off Your Nerves
      7 min read

    • Article

      Craniosacral Therapy

      Mar 3, 2020

      Craniosacral Therapy
      2 min read

    • Article

      Your Posture Keeps The Score

      Nov 17, 2022

      Somatics (in the tradition of Thomas Hanna) teaches you how your posture is an expression of your nervous system and gives you a doorway into understanding how stress and anxiety affects you, not only mentally and emotionally, but physically too. Our

      4 min read

    • Article

      ‘It’s Not About Toxins Or Blood Flow!’

      Nov 5, 2020

      In your view, how does massage work? My approach is very evidence-based, and I understand that the research into massage is pretty minimal. As a massage therapist, I’m not trying to fix someone; my job is to explain and use a hands-on approach to inf

      2 min read

    • Article

      Natural Healing

      May 4, 2022

      Natural Healing
      3 min read

    • Article

      Happy New Yoga!

      Dec 30, 2021

      Happy New Yoga!
      6 min read

    • Article

      Pain Empowerment

      Jun 18, 2021

      Pain Empowerment
      3 min read

    • Article

      With Takkesh

      Aug 3, 2022

      With Takkesh
      3 min read

    • Article

      Placebo

      Nov 1, 2022

      Placebo
      3 min read

    • Article

      MINDFULNESS is Medicine

      Nov 24, 2019

      MINDFULNESS is Medicine
      5 min read

    • Article

      Yoga, Ageing And The Menopause

      Oct 22, 2021

      Yoga, Ageing And The Menopause
      5 min read

    • Article

      Sugar Coating It

      Jul 23, 2023

      Sugar Coating It
      8 min read

    • Article

      Show Yourself Some LOOE

      Sep 5, 2021

      Show Yourself Some LOOE
      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Fix It With Your Hands

    1/5

    1 rating0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Fix It With Your Hands - Nancy J. Johns

      © 2018 Nancy J Johns

      All rights reserved

      No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

      Print ISBN: 978-1-54395-213-1

      eBook ISBN: 978-1-54395-214-8

      The techniques described in this book are to be used by persons who have the additional training to evaluate the appropriateness of this intervention in individual cases. It is the responsibility of the practitioner to insure the safety of the patient and the provider when using this technique.

      You let your education

      and your soul

      dance together

      -Dewey Anich

      Contents

      Acknowledgments

      Introduction

      Working with Fascia

      Getting Started: Listen, Look, Feel

      Pieces of the Puzzle

      The Shoulder

      The Neck

      The Upper Extremity

      Intermittent Tingling in the Hands

      The Trunk

      The Pelvis and Low Back

      The Hip

      Sciatica – Not always from a Disc

      The Lower Extremity

      Final Thoughts

      Being a Therapist is Hard Work

      References

      Appendix

      List of Releases by Patient Position

      Acknowledgments

      The support of so many people who helped bring this book into being was the best part of writing it. I thank first of all the patients who encouraged me to share with other therapists this way of working. As I approach retirement, passing on these thoughts and observations seems like the best way to continue to help people with persistent musculoskeletal pain.

      Thank you to the photographers, especially Peggy McCaffrey for sharing her time and expertise, as well as Beth Blanken and Jamie Sculley for filling in the gaps. Thank you to the patients willing to be photographed; Judy, Cindi, Dava, Gordon, and Jennifer. The illustrations are an important part of explaining the technique, and we could not have done them without you!

      Thank you to Mark McNabb for taking a vague idea and turning it into the cover image. A huge thank you to my long-time friend Lone Vilnius for designing the cover and refining all the images in the book.

      Thank you, Annie Wach, for improving the language and punctuation of the text. The feedback from Beth Cardell of University of Utah was extremely valuable in improving the precision and clarity of the ideas presented. Thank you both for the detailed effort. The suggestions of Jordan Benson to help the book be more pertinent to young, practicing therapists were very much appreciated. And the eagle eye of Mary Wyckoff was very much appreciated for the final editorial clean up.

      Thanks to all the unnamed people who gave feedback and supported the project with their questions and enthusiasm. And thank you to my husband Tim, for his support and encouragement not only for this project, but his support of my career over the years. You are the wind beneath my wings.

      September 2018

      Introduction

      How we are trained shapes how we practice. Using the anatomy and kinesiology texts we learned from, many of us have a very mechanical paradigm that we use as we analyze the cause of a physical dysfunction as well as choosing ways to help our patients overcome the resulting deficits. From my training, I visualized building a body by first laying out the underlying structure and framework of the bones, tying them together with ligaments, mobilizing them with muscles attached at various angles, and then threading blood vessels and nerves through the whole creation to nourish and activate it. If this is my paradigm, and if the body is not working right, these are the structures I look to for remedies. But what if the body is formed as a fluid filled sac with layers of cells that take shape in greater or lesser densities and specializations and complexity until the organism takes on life and movement as an integrated whole? Kind of like an embryo growing into a living, moving being. When you hold that image as a template and analyze dysfunction, you see it differently.

      This book is written primarily for occupational and physical therapists at the early stages of their career to help build a paradigm based on the things we as therapists are beginning to learn about fascia. If you use this paradigm when working with persons who have musculoskeletal dysfunction, you may find your way to solutions not currently evident to you. I am sure this book will also be used successfully by massage therapists, chiropractors, athletic trainers and many others. But as an occupational therapist myself, I am assuming the background training of OT’s and PT’s and the kind of clinical situations we find ourselves in as I write. My experience has been primarily with adults, although there are practitioners who have adapted this tool for use with children appropriately.

      This is not a scholarly review of the current literature. It does not contain independently verified evidence of the effectiveness of this technique. Back before medicine became so business oriented, therapy departments had the treasure of time for experienced therapists to mentor and share knowledge with newer therapists on a much more extensive level than what we see today. This book is written from that perspective. I am sharing what I have learned: from my own study, from courses taught by others and from my experiences with my patients. I have purposely chosen a casual format for presenting this material. I want the information to feel accessible and easy to work with. I want the reader to feel they could vary the technique based on their observations or even invent new releases as they get more experienced.

      Myofascial release is a tool that can be used by many different practitioners, usually licensed. Nothing in this book should be construed as intended to change your scope of practice. Before applying any of these techniques, you must first evaluate your client within your scope of practice to see if myofascial release is an appropriate tool to use. For everyone, I recommend you keep your old kinesiology book at hand to remind yourself of the movement forces that are common for the structures addressed.

      There are many different approaches to working with fascia; it is an area of study that has expanded greatly in recent years. Some techniques emphasize sustained holding and some dynamic unwinding. Some use very strong pressure and others quite light. Some self-help techniques emphasize physical tools such as balls or rollers that apply pressure to release the fascia like pressing on a sponge. The techniques described here are combinations of what I have learned from others and from my patients. I use short and cumulative releases building toward a new shape or whole. The releases open, elongate, soften and sometimes lift the soft tissue to change it. This is not just fancy stretching. The consistency and shape and resilience of the tissue can be altered and frequently is. Myofascial release has helped many patients with persistent musculoskeletal pain decrease the restrictions causing pain and restore balanced movement patterns. I hope you find it helpful in your practice.

      You can use this book in a number of different ways. You may simply read through some of the descriptions of how fascial restrictions impair function and cause pain. With a shift in your insight as to the underlying problem, you may then go on to use your own, usual techniques to remedy the problem. The book will have helped you innovate your analysis even without the techniques. You may end up looking at just a couple of the interventions described that match the population you usually serve and blend these releases with your other techniques. Or, you may end up adopting the whole approach, shifting what you do on a fundamental level, and go on to continue to discover new ways of helping your patients.

      The primary shift I encourage you to make is to use your training as a reference tool, not a lens. Use your direct observations, both visual and tactile, to better analyze and understand what the patient in front of you is dealing with, and how you can help. Don’t just try on the different diagnoses and syndromes you have studied to see which fits best. Start with each person fresh: listen to their story, look with your trained eye, and recognize the validity of what you are feeling in their body. This is their current reality. See if you can help fix it with your hands. However you use this book, I wish for you the pleasure and success I have found in using this technique to help patients find improved musculoskeletal balance and healing.

      Working with Fascia

      As therapists, we work with a wide variety of people to help them overcome pain, dysfunction and disability. Many times, we achieve great results, but sometimes there is that patient who just does not get the results we hope for. They seem motivated and co-operative. But something isn’t working. The pain is better with some movement but worse with either too much movement or too little. Sometimes patients report they are able to do some more challenging activities, but the next day the pain is worse. They complete their exercises but instead of getting stronger, they hurt more, or the pain decreases in one location and increases somewhere else. This is frustrating for both the therapist and the patient. What is going on?

      Not all dysfunction is from poor strength or coordination. Sometimes the muscles seem to be working, but our interventions do not help the muscles get better. The problem could be in the fascia.

      What is Fascia?

      The fascia is a living netlike substance that extends through the body as a single system. Our attention to fascia has recently increased greatly, but our understanding is only in the early stages. This book is not a review of current findings of fascial research. One of the most comprehensive description of fascia I have reviewed is in the first chapter of Anatomy Trains: Myofascial Meridians for Manual and Movement Therapists (Myers, 2014). We are now beginning to see articles popping up in a variety of professional and lay journals talking about fascia. Some with well-founded claims, others not so much. I strongly encourage you to further investigate what new findings are coming out in the area of research on fascia. But to get started, I will share my understanding and the visualizations that help me work in this area.

      To start, begin to visualize how the fascia envelopes and permeates the body. If you have not yet viewed it, be sure to go online to see Strolling Under the Skin (Guimberteau, 2014) for some fascinating visuals of living fascia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eW0lvOVKDxE Another way to visualize fascia is to compare it to the connective tissues found in an orange. Under the skin, there is a complete envelope of substance that is also attached, to some degree, to the material that surrounds each segment of the orange. This material is in turn more finely connected to the wrappings of the small juice morsels within the segments. The fascia of the body is attached to the skin and can be manipulated through contact with the skin. It surrounds the muscles and divides them into compartments and eventually into smaller bundles of muscle fibers. It connects muscle groups and helps disperse the force and movement of the contracting muscles in a 3 dimensional manner. The fascia extends in differing densities from the surroundings of the muscles onto the tendons and ligaments, even onto the periosteum and bone.

      Fairly recently, the Fascia Research Society established a task force to address the need for a more specific definition of fascia as interest and research continue to expand. They differentiated between the physical tissue of a fascia and the more functional definition of the fascial system.

      Another way to visualize the fascia is to imagine working with raw meat. When you are cooking and preparing chicken, the sticky, slimy substance that is stretched and torn as you pull the skin away is fascia. The substance that separates and defines the different muscles within the leg or thigh or breast is also fascia. You can even see the fascia become more specific and denser as it gathers toward the tendon that you find at the end of chicken tenders. Those of us who were lucky enough to be able to participate in cadaver dissection during our education can likely still visualize some aspects of fascia even though it may not have been specifically studied. Think about how you

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1