This course consists of an upper and lower half of the body approach to Muscle Energy. Diagnosing each region of the body, to help narrow down the actual place to treat will be covered in detail. Then, a diagnosis will be given and a treatment for each diagnosis. The treatment approach is principle based, thus, if you wish to treat a structure not covered in the course, you will have the understanding of how to accomplish it.
What make this course different from other muscle energy courses is not only its content (more on that later), but its history. I learned muscle energy from Ed Stiles, DO, FAAOdist. Ed was in Fred Mitchell, Sr’s. first muscle energy course. Fred invented muscle energy. Ed was the only person from that original course to go back to Fred’s office and further learn from him and make sure he had Fred’s concepts and applications understood and could apply them to patients. Ed then went on to teach Muscle Energy across the US and the world. We learned muscle energy from Ed in medical school in a principle-based approach. From how the facet pairs move in relation to each other during normal motion to which facet pair (and its associated muscles and ligaments) are affected altered motion is present. This principle based and anatomical treatment approach has allowed me to keep the principles present in each patient encounter and change the application with each visit if necessary (if a patient can’t move in one direction for example).
We will learn Fred Sr’s approach to the sacrum and pelvis, but you won’t learn how to treat the sacrum making the patient do gymnastics on the table (as in taught in osteopathic schools). It is not that these traditionally taught forms don’t work - but they require a lot of bodily gymnastics and aren’t always practical in clinical practice. In my course we learn how to use the principles to treat the body from a seated position - ALL of the body. We will learn how to treat from a prone or supine position - again ALL of the body. That way you can use muscle energy in any application on any patient - whether they are seated, standing, prone or supine. We also get VERY specific about which fibers of which muscle are the root of the issue. This makes you precise in your treatments from the beginning. You will also learn how to time your efforts with the rhythms of the body to even further increase your treatment results.