Dr. Benjamin will be interviewing Erik about his background, his work, and his thoughts about the field. Erik has practiced manual therapy for more than 33 years in a variety of clinical settings. He is the founder of the Freedom from Pain Institute and the author of two textbooks, Advanced Myoskeletal Techniques and Dynamic Body: Exploring Form, Expanding Function Book and the new Level 4 – 32 CE Home Study Course

Register here..
https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/313698066

Three years ago we officially launched this adventure with the release of the 6-dvd Myoskeletal Alignment for Low Back, Hip & Leg Pain video series. At that point, none of the Freedom of Pain Institute staff (including my- almost- ex-wife) dreamed how long it would take to complete the companion Dynamic Body textbook.

But as months passed and the word spread, a host of luminary authors agreed to come aboard and, suddenly, the project exploded both with excitement and apprehension. Rich with 20 chapters from top practitioners and researchers in physical therapy, structural integration, osteopathy, functional movement, and chiropractic, the Dynamic Body book delivers its own unique and intriguing flow of ideas, techniques and research that visually stimulates even the layperson.

Dynamic Body captured the writings of influential pioneers such as Tom Myers, Serge Gracovetsky, Art Riggs, James Waslaski, Judith Aston, Gil Hedley, Robert Schleip, Jerry Hesch, Aaron Mattes, Aline Newton, Adjo Zorn, Robert Irvin, Divo Muller, Til Luchau and Craig Liebenson.  These forward-thinking clinicians and researchers have been influential figures in my work and played a substantial role in the concepts presented in the 6-DVD Myoskeletal Alignment set.

The collective vision of the Dynamic Body home-study program is to broaden the human perspective and demonstrate that there are many different ways to achieve balance.  We hope you agree.

Customarily, when we see cases of upward shearing of the ilium on the sacrum, the client’s SI joints are lacking either form or force closure. Form closure is provided to a joint by the skeletal framework. A series of ridges and complementary depressions produces friction and helps interlock the two bones, providing form closure to the SI joint (Fig. 2).

Synovial joints, on the other hand, perform best when there is minimal movement between the ilial and sacral articular cartilage surfaces. This minimal movement, termed joint play, not only provides spinal shock absorption, but also enhances lower extremity torque and transverse rotations, which help lift and propel the body through space (Fig. 3).

Musculofascial tissues reactto keep the sacroiliac joints in balance and move them back into form closure provided by the skeletal framework. The “binding” force contributed by musculofascial tissues is termed force closure. As defined by Andry Vleeming, Ph.D., force closure is Mother Nature’s backup system to nurture joint stability.

Force closure stability is generated by contractive action of core musculofascial tissues, such as the pelvic diaphragm, transverse abdominis, multifidus, and thoracolumbar fascia (Fig.4). In partnership, these deep core stabilizers provide a sophisticated neurologic feedback mechanism that reflexively interacts with the brain to provide coordinated movement and pelvic balance.

When the body is continuously subjected to an unbalanced load, viscoelastic tissues responsible for force closure can become strained. Prolonged cyclical loading can deform SI joint ligaments to the point where an act as innocent as slamming on the brake, tumbling on one hip, or clumsily stepping off a curb can jostle the joint enough to cause the ilium to “jump-a-notch” on the sacrum.

Read More ~
Low Back Piriformis SI Joint Pain

• Low Back Pain
• Sacroiliac and Pelvic Problems
• Hip Capsule Adhesions
• O-A and A-A Compensations
• Functional Scoliosis
• Rotator Cuff Impingement

This is the only time to catch Erik Dalton and his fabulous TAs in 2012 so don’t miss out on the fun in this 70% hands-on multi-media presentation. It’ll change the way you work!

OUTCOMES
Workshop participants will leave this 70% hands-on workshop with skills to help them: Identify and treat musculofascial length-strength imbalances. Understand theory and research related to neck, ribcage, low back and hip pain.

Join host Felicia Brown and legendary educator Erik Dalton PhD. for this special interview on ONE Concept Radio. Erik will be discussing his upcoming full day workshop at the American Massage Chiropractic and Acupuncture Conference : DALTON’S FAVORITE TECHNIQUES FOR NECKS, PECS, LOW BACKS & LATS.

Listen to Erik Dalton Pre-Conference Interview

***Attendees MUST bring a massage table (1 for 2 people), lotion and linens for this class. We will have limited massage tebales for rent. To inquire about sharing, please post on our AMC FaceBook page.****

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Let's call this guy Bob.. He sits at a computer all day and his brain relearns this aberrant posture as normal. On weekend outings, his hip flexed posture morphs into similarly distorted riding posture.

Like many of America’s other popular, but functionally abnormal, athletic endeavors, such as golf, tennis, and bowling, cyclists bring with them a complex biomechanical downside that’s often hard to completely fix. If you are a massage therapist or athletic trainer who treats cyclists it’s vital to precisely identify the anatomical structure at fault, and weed out any risk factors that may predispose the client to injury.

Risk factors will be:
Intrinsic (within the cyclist – any postural, overuse, or faulty movement dysfunctions)
Extrinsic (the bicycle setup)

Therefore, as a Massage Therapist treatment
is always twofold:
1.    Identify and correct muscle imbalances, joint dysfunctions, and motor control problems.
2.    Address the underlying causes for the injury by correcting bike setup and/or training errors.

The good news is that the human body is both adaptable and dynamic. The bad news is that our cyclists often bring along a lot of baggage, including flexion-addicted sitting postures, old injuries, compensations, and poor training habits. Any weakness or motor control issues are magnified by traumatic shocks due to unsavory road conditions or recurring bike injuries.

Cyclist who consistently ride with an anteriorly rotates pelvis and decreased hip angle are subject to capsular and ligamentus adhesions, short quadriceps and psoas, and a subsequent loss of economy and power.

A properly fitted bike, combined with a revitalized and functionally balanced neuro-myoskeletal system, allows muscles and joints to work at optimal levels of motor unit recruitment and synchronization. As endurance and performance improve, so does the enjoyment of cycling.

Cycling Biomechanics
The actual cause of ITB pain is an extremely important discovery for manual therapists or sports therapist who work with cyclists and runners. If the underlying fat pad is indeed the main cause of our client’s lateral knee pain, it is probably not a good idea to apply compressive forces over the ITB tendon, which is already squashing the inflamed fat pad. Traditional techniques, such as cross-fiber frictioning and ITB fascia-mashing, would be contraindicated.

Above from Erik Dalton’s Vicious Cycle
Chapter In the New Dynamic Body Textbook.

Enjoy a 10% discount off the $87.95 price
of the book by putting in the discount code dalton3 at checkout

Hard Cover – Over 400 glossy full color pages, hundreds of photos and illustrations.

To order… go to Order Dalton Dynamic Body Textbook

Click to look inside Dynamic Body Textbook

by Erik Dalton, Ph.D.

The biomechanical effect of heels in everything from running shoes to stilettos has puzzled researchers and fired controversy for almost a century. In a highly functioning body, the neuro-myo-skeletal system ‘hangs’ in dynamic equilibrium, each part balancing the other. But when a woman wears high heels, a new dynamic equilibrium occurs (Fig 1) If one body part becomes ‘fixed,’ the whole system must compensate with altered movement patterns resulting in kinetic chain ‘kinks.’ Here’s an interesting experiment that’ll help you get a feel for biomechanical adjustments high-heel wearers deal with every day: • Stand barefoot with the back against a wall. Observe how your ‘upright’ body column forms a perpendicular line (ninety degree angle) with the floor (Fig 2A).

• Slide a two inch wedge of some kind (phone book, etc.) under both heels and notice that by keeping your body column rigid, you’re forced to tilt forward from ninety to about seventy degrees (Fig 2B).

• Now replace with a three inch heel wedge and straighten up so you’re touching the wall again and feel the dramatic myo-skeletal adaptations that take place. Can you feel your ankles shift from dorsi to plantar-flexion? In this standing posture, the knees are buckled, hips flexed, low back swayed, and the shoulder girdle retracted (Fig 2C).

The brain, guided by foot, ankle and visual proprioceptors, must instantaneously make a whole series of myofascial and joint adjustments (ankle, knee, hip, spine, and head) to regain and retain erect stance and equilibrium (Fig 3). But high-heeled posturo-functional faults are not confined to the external milieu; they may also inflict compressional damage on the internal viscera…particularly pelvic bowl contents. According to research conducted by Diane Lee, excessive lumbar lordosis causes the pelvic bowl to dip anteriorly which raises the body’s center of gravity leading to reduced proprioceptive stability.1

Not only are we more unstable on our feet, but the increased anterior pelvic tilt squashes our poor organs. For example, when standing barefoot, the anterior angle (pelvic tilt) of the female pelvis is twenty-five degrees; on low, one-inch heels it increases to thirty degrees; on two-inch heels to forty-five degrees and on three-inch heels to sixty degrees. You don’t have to be a physicist to envision how increased heel height causes gravity to compress and distort abdominal organs (Fig 4). Hopefully one day we’ll see a well-designed study testing the relationship of long-term high-heel wearing and ‘gut’ problems such as prolapsed colons, distended bladders, hemorrhoids, etc.

Many women love to wear high heels, and I might add many men like women in high heels. However, it’s true that some women suffer for their vanities. In young women, this is accommodated fairly well by ankle and hip mobility and low back stability. But, many high-heel wearing women find that as they age and the hip joints stiffen, shock waves shoot through the lumbar spine causing disc compression, ligamentous laxity and facet joint spurring. Women should be cautious about wearing heels constantly, or over long periods of time.

Clearly, the human foot was not designed to walk in stilettos… or cowboy boots for that matter. The foot is specifically constructed to land in a heel to toe ‘rolling’ motion whereby the arch, ankle, and knee absorb shock (stored energy) and release the ground reaction force up the kinetic chain to counter-rotate the torso and pelvis. The heeled shoe steals this propulsive power from tendons, ligaments and leg muscles. Not only do heels place the foot and leg under greater stress to achieve the demands of propulsion, but the borrowed power must be ‘leeched” from higher structures in the kinetic chain, i.e., knees, thigh muscles, hips, and trunk. As a small army of anatomical reinforcements are recruited to rescue the handicapped fascial tissues, the body continues to lose energy to the ground. Shoe heels of any height set in motion a series of gait-negative consequences, making natural gait — meaning the barefoot form — impossible. Don’t let your clients be a slave to fashion; fix their feet and give them back the natural spring in their step.

Reference: 1. Lee, C-M et al. “Biomechanical Effects of Wearing High Heel Shoes”. Int’l J of Industrial Ergonomics 28: 321 – 326, 2001

Techniques as illustrated in
Level IV 6 DVD set…
Myoskeletal Alignment for
Low Back, Hip & Leg Pain

This is a portion of the Dalton Newsletter… to view the entire newsletter, and information about special newsletter offers and upcoming workshops… go to DaltonArticles.com

dollars on healthcare

Look at the $$$ we’re spending. New report from the Institute of Medicine: “Healthcare providers should tailor pain care to each patient’s experience and promote self-management of chronic pain, a condition that affects more than 116 million Americans and costs the U.S. up to $635 billion annually in medical treatment and lost productivity.”

There are, however, many advantages to home study courses that make it very easy to maintain your CE certification while enhancing your education in a conveniently packaged format.

• Build your bodywork library: I’m a video and book ‘junkie’ and am very fond of my large library of Massage Therapy education Videos, DVDs and textbooks, which I refer to often. This collection includes many of the masters of our profession such as Ida Rolf, Philip Greenman, Vladimir Janda, Stewart McGill, and others. I’ll throw one on in the morning when running on my treadmill and it ignites a spark that I can take into the therapy room that day. Even if I’ve watched it many times before, I always pick up something new. A high-quality home study course offers a lifetime reference source to help build on the material you learned in massage school. My advice is to immediately begin constructing a quality library that shows your clients and fellow therapists that you’re passionate about your work.
• All CE courses are not created equal. You’ll not benefit the same from “so-called” quick and easy online CE courses designed to complete in a couple hours and once finished, you’re left with no reference material…no handsome books and videos to display in your clinic. However, there are some wonderful distance e-learning programs and podcasts available through top educators such as Whitney Lowe, Ben Benjamin, Tom Myers, Art Riggs, and the World Massage Conference that allow therapists to go back and reference the material they’ve learned..
• Expense: If you live far from a convenient workshop, are disabled, or have a hardship, you probably should evaluate the time and expense of travel, high gas prices and airline inconveniences. Often, not only do you have to pay for transportation, but also accommodations and food. Travel and lodging is not an issue with a course that you can complete in the relaxed, no time-limit of your home or office. The Freedom From Pain Institute offers fast multiple-choice online testing in addition to books, videos and free home-study Ethics courses.

“I have been in practice for 25 years with advanced training in many bodywork disciplines, so when I have to spend time and money for CEUs to maintain my state and national certification, I am very careful and particular. Having read some of Erik Dalton’s magazine articles over the years, I researched his home study programs and purchased the Advanced Myoskeletal Techniques course. This program proved to be very comprehensive. Erik has a gift for articulating complex data so that it’s easy to understand and integrate into your practice. Beyond expanding my knowledge base and skills, the course gave me tools to educate my clients in a way that excites them about their own process. Gift yourself this program today!” -
Vince Falone, New York City

There are unique and equally important benefits to both types of certification education. I would suggest that you take advantage of both. Both have a place in your ongoing training, but don’t forget to build your bodywork library!

The Freedom From Pain Institute offers two beautifully produced top selling NCBTMB approved home study courses for massage and bodywork therapists. These detailed, professionally produced courses offer pain management techniques for finding and fixing chronic postural and functional pain problems through innovative deep-tissue, joint-stretching and postural therapeutic routines that will elevate your clients to a new level of health. Upon completion you will be awarded a beautiful “Certified Myoskeletal Therapist” diploma.

As a bonus you will also receive a FREE listing on www.erikdalton.com/certified-therapist to help promote your business. Google loves those backlinks!