From Head to Toe: A Holistic Approach to Physiotherapy

“The arm bone is connected to the shoulder bone. The shoulder bone is connected to the back bone.”

So, the children’s sing-a-long goes.

In my ten plus years as a physiotherapist I’ve heard countless patients say they felt their seemingly unrelated issues were the result of the same problem.

When studying physiotherapy, we were taught to assess the regions above and below the area of complaint.

For someone presenting with lower back pain, you would assess their lower back, upper back and hips. You would take note of their overall posture (poked chin, flat feet, etc), but your focus would be more local.

Treating the symptoms.

It wasn’t until I began my training in ConnectTherapyTM that I truly began to appreciate the mechanisms of how areas like neck or foot could impact lower back pain.

When you consider whole body function and movement you can see why areas distal from the area of pain can have such a large impact.

Imagine this.

You’ve broken your right ankle. Casted and non-weight-bearing.

What happens to the rest of your body?

• Body weight shifts left.
• Right glutes weaken.
• Altered pelvis control.
• Trunk shifts to the left.
• Head tries to maintain balance, staying right.

Five months later.

• You’ve lost the boot and had some physio.
• You’re now running 5k 3 times a week.
• You’re upper back starts to get tight.
• Then the constant headaches.

Now you can’t run, you can’t focus, you’re stressed.

What’s causing the headache?

Neck? Trunk? Pelvis? Foot?

ConnectTherapy explores the relationships between these regions (and others) with consideration to whole body alignment, biomechanics and control. It considers all potential internal and external influences. Postural habits. All past injuries. The BIG picture!

Not everyone with a right ankle fracture will develop headaches after getting back into running.

So, WHY did you? Speak to the team to find out.

#connecttherapy #ljlee #physiotherapy #lowerbackpain