Functional Strength: An Updated Approach to Exercising our Patients

Course Description

Do you want to learn a cool, new way to look at strengthening your patients? This course incorporates movement pattern assessment and strengthening into one approach for you and your patients. Through it, you'll learn more about the concepts of force couples, muscle slings, and functional/dysfunctional movement patterns, and how to use them to determine the ideal exercise selection and progression to customize your exercise programs.

Exercise specificity improves patient compliance, understanding, and overall fun when patients feel or see immediate results through the utilization of the test-treat-retest treatment model taught in this course.

As with all our courses, this course will be at least 75% hands-on lab. It's important to note that participants will not be required to perform all of the exercises demonstrated in the course.

 

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What people are saying!

Instructor was able to relate the techniques that he was teaching to our patient populations and give us modifications and progressions as necessary to meet our clinical needs. He also related the techniques and concepts to billing and documentation requirements. Excellent course that was interactive and kept me engaged the whole weekend.
Cody, WY
I found several modifications to exercises I already use and new applications of exercises that I can use with patients at varying levels of ability.
Chattanooga, TN
Information was delivered in a systematic manner that was very helpful to learning. Material was reviewed multiple times over the course of the weekend.
Canton, MI
It pushed me beyond my comfort zone and enables me to push my patients too. It was good to learn the variations of the exercises to make it easier and then the progression of it.
Lansing, MI
The thing I value from the course the most is the hands-on everyday examples that were used. The ability to use some of the things I learned the next day at work was really important to me. The flow during the course was great made 2 whole days seem like no time at all.
Live Hybrid

Top Takeaways

  • Peel back why a particular dysfunctional movement is occurring
  • Look at your patient's dysfunctional movement with "new eyes" to better determine reoccurring compensatory patterns within the plane of motion
  • Improve your ability to create customized functional strengthening programs that specifically address your patient’s movement dysfunctions and goals

Course Objectives

At the completion of this seminar, the participant will be able to:

  • Given a case study, assess functional weakness in a patient using the four pathological barriers to ideal/optimal movement
  • Perform an assessment of a dysfunctional movement pattern and specifically identify 2 primary and 1-2 secondary compensatory movements occurring due to weakness and/or pain
  • ​Accurately justify the use of functional strength testing versus manual muscle testing when assessing a patient
  • Properly exhibit and/or correctly perform 4 exercises using a functional approach to muscle activity
  • Correctly state the rationale for an in-depth functional strength assessment of upper extremity, lower extremity and trunk
  • Properly execute an in-depth functional strength assessment of upper extremity, lower extremity and trunk
  • Correctly apply force couples, synergies, and muscle slings to the body to address function-specific strength deficits
  • Develop and implement a comprehensive functional exercise program, progressing from basic to advanced levels for patients

Course Instructors

Stuart Orr

BS, PTA, NSCA-CPT, CWcHP

Stuart Orr graduated from Pennsylvania State University earning his AS in Applied Sciences with a concentration in Physical Therapy Assistant in 1999. In 2006 he earned his BS in Marketing and Management from Pennsylvania State University. Stuart holds certifications as an exercise specialist through the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA-CPT), Matheson Functional Capacity Evaluator and Workers Compensation Healthcare Provider. Stuart is ongoing in post graduate continuing education to develop his clinical and manual skills, yet also has found a passion for teaching other healthcare professionals as an assistant instructor with Great Lakes Seminars since 2003. Stuart has more than 12 years of orthopedic and sports medicine experience & has worked extensively within the worker’s compensation field assisting the injured worker in getting back to the labor force. Stuart is currently a regional director of Work Hardening/ Conditioning for ATI Physical Therapy for PA/ Northern DE.

Stuart Orr

Course Outline

Saturday

7:30am

Doors Open

8:00am

Lecture: Introduction, Strength Principles, Action vs Function, Patterns, Couples and Synergies

10:15am

Lecture: Movement Dysfunction, Compensation, Assessment, and Exercise Selection

12:00pm

Lunch (on your own)

1:00pm

Lab: Fundamentals and Rolling Patterns

3:15pm

Lab: Functional Exercises for the Upper Extremity

5:00pm

Review and Questions

5:30pm

Adjourn

Sunday

7:30pm

Doors Open

8:00am

Review and Evident-Based Literature Review

8:30am

Lab: Functional Exercises for the Upper Extremity

10:15am

Lab: Functional Exercises for the Lower Extremity

12:00pm

Lunch (on your own)

1:00pm

Lab: Functional Exercises for the Lower Extremity 

3:15pm

Lab: Sport-Specific Functional Exercises

4:00pm

Review Session and Group Activity Case Studies  

5:00pm

Adjourn

Course PDF

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