Building the Ultimate Back- From Rehabilitation to Performance

This two day course combines lecture and hands-on skills development workshops to introduce the McGill Method of enhancing patient outcome.

Global Objectives:

• To update delegates on the most recent developments in function of the lumbar spine – specifically how it works and how it becomes injured, and how this is linked to pain sensitivity. This is to develop an evidence based foundation for clinical decision making.
• To provide guidance in the application of this knowledge to the clinic, workplace, rehabilitation centre, and sports field to reduce the risk of injury, optimize healing of the patient, and build ultimate back performance in the athlete.
• To give practice and technique development with workshops throughout both days.

Brief Description of Topics:

4 hours – Building the foundation: Dispel the myths about how the spine works and becomes injured. Anatomical, biomechanical and motor control perspectives are provided to setup the clinical approaches

2 hours – Interpreting patient presentation: Understand aberrant motion and motor patterns and possibilities for corrective exercise. Provocative tests and their mechanical basis provide guidance for optimal exercise design. Lecture and workshop

1 Hour – Preventing Back Disorders: No clinician can be successful without removing the cause of back troubles in patients. This section teaches delegates how to identify the causes and how to remove them. Lecture and workshop.

5 Hours – Rehabilitation Exercise: Biomechanics and Clinical Practices – Many exercises prescribed to low back patients have not been subjected to scientific examination. This component of the course attempts to quantify and rank exercises for their spine loading, muscle usage and stabilizing potential. Algorithms for choosing the best exercise approach for each individual are provided. Technique is then honed to make exercise tolerable and effective. Lecture and workshop

4 Hours – Training for performance – Training the back for performance (either athletic or occupational) requires different approaches and objectives than training to fulfil rehabilitation objectives. Some of the techniques developed in our work with world class athletes will be introduced and discussed within the context of valid mechanisms and evidence. These include the progressions from establishing motor control patterns, through to stability, endurance, strength, power and agility. Formalization of some of the performance “tricks” including how to get through “sticking points”, and developing “superstiffness” will be done in lecture and practical sessions.