Podcast 138 (for real). Are you fighting your own gait/running neurology?

Topics:
1. Running with the extensors. Convergence and divergence of neurons.
2. Fighting your gait neurology. The lies about the Bird dog rehab exercise.
3. ACL and ACL rehab. Surgery or no sugery. Wise? Risks ? How social media discussions might just be getting it wrong.
4. Cross over gait and lateral heel strike and ensuing problems at great toe off. A failure to medial foot tripod high gear toe off ?
5. Are the hip flexors actually hip flexors in gait ? what are your high knee drills doing? Anything good?

Key words: acl, analysis, cross, extensor, flexors, gait, heel, hip, instability, knee, over, plri, pools, problems, running, strike, surgery

Links to find the podcast:

iTunes page: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-gait-guys-podcast/id559864138?mt=2

Direct Download:http://traffic.libsyn.com/thegaitguys/pod_138_real_-_82818_2.12_PM.mp3

Permalink URL:http://thegaitguys.libsyn.com/podcast-138-for-real

Libsyn URL: http://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/6978817

Our Websites:
www.thegaitguys.com

summitchiroandrehab.com

doctorallen.co

shawnallen.net

Our website is all you need to remember. Everything you want, need and wish for is right there on the site.
Interested in our stuff ? Want to buy some of our lectures or our National Shoe Fit program? Click here (thegaitguys.com or thegaitguys.tumblr.com) and you will come to our websites. In the tabs, you will find tabs for STORE, SEMINARS, BOOK etc. We also lecture every 3rd Wednesday of the month on onlineCE.com. We have an extensive catalogued library of our courses there, you can take them any time for a nominal fee (~$20).

Our podcast is on iTunes and just about every other podcast harbor site, just google "the gait guys podcast", you will find us.

Gaining Anterior Length, Through Posterior Strength. A Lesson in Reciprocal Inhibition

Gaining Anterior Length, Through Posterior Strength and vice versa….A Lesson in Reciprocal Inhibition

I found a really cool article, quite by accident. I was leafing through an older copy of one of, if not my favorite Journals “Lower Extremity Review” and there it was. An article entitled “Athletes with hip flexor tightness have reduced gluteus maximus activation”. Wow, I thought! Now there is a great article on reciprocal inhibition! This reminded me of a piece we wrote some time ago

What is reciprocal inhibition, also called “reciprocal innervation” you ask? The concept, was 1st observed as early as 1626 by Rene Descartes though observed in the 19th century, was not fully understood and accepted until it earned a Nobel prize for its creditor, Sir Charles Sherrington, in 1932.

Simply put, when a muscle contracts, its antagonist is neurologically inhibited (see the diagram above) When your hip flexors contract, your hip extensors are inhibited. This holds true whether you actively contract the muscle or if the muscle is irritated in some manner, causing contraction. The reflex has to do with muscle spindles and Type I and Type II afferents which I have covered in an article I wrote some time ago.

We can (and often do) take advantage of this concept with treating the bellies of hip flexors (iliopsoas, tensor fascia lata, rectus femoris, iliacus, iliocapsularis) and extensors (gluteus maximus, posterior fibers of gluteus medius). This is especially important in folks with low back pain, as they often have increased psoas activity and cross sectional area, especially in the presence of degenerative changes.

There also appears to be a correlation between decreased hip extension and low back pain, with a difference of as little as 10 degrees being significant. Take the time to do a thorough history and exam and pay attention to hip extension and ankle dorsiflexion as they should be the same, with at least 10 degrees seeming to be the “clinical” minimum. Since the psoas should only fire at the end of terminal stance/preswing and into early swing, problems begin to arise when it fires for longer periods.

Can you see now how taking advantage of reciprocal inhibition can improve your outcomes? Even something as simple as taping the gluteus can have a positive effect! Try this today or this week in the clinic, not only with your patients hip flexors, but with all muscle groups, always thinking about agonist/antagonist relationships.

In the moment: Sports medicine  Jordana Bieze Foster: Athletes with hip flexor tightness have reduced gluteus maximus activation  Lower Extremity review Vol 6, Number 7 2014

https://tmblr.co/ZrRYjx1VG3KYy

Mills M, Frank B, Blackburn T, et al. Effect of limited hip flexor length on gluteal activation during an overhead squat in female soccer players. J Athl Train 2014;49(3 Suppl):S-83.

Ciuffreda KJ, Stark L.  Descartes’ law of reciprocal innervation. Am J Optom Physiol Opt. 1975 Oct;52(10):663-73.
Jacobson M Foundations of Neuroscience Springer Science and Business Media, Plenum Press, NY 1993 p 277

http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1932/sherrington-bio.html

https://thegaitguys.tumblr.com/post/9708399904/ah-yes-the-ia-and-type-ii-afferents-one-of-our

Arbanas J, Pavlovic I, Marijancic V, et al MRI features of the psoas major muscle in patients with low back pain. Eur Spine J. 2013 Sep;22(9):1965-71. doi: 10.1007/s00586-013-2749-x. Epub 2013 Mar 31.

Roach SM, San Juan JG, Suprak DN, Lyda M, Bies AJ, Boydston CR. Passive hip range of motion is reduced in active subjects with chronic low back pain compared to controls. Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2015 Feb;10(1):13-20. Erratum in: Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2015 Aug;10(4):572.

Paatelma M Karvonen E Heiskanen J Clinical perspective: how do clinical test results differentiate chronic and subacute low back pain patients from “non‐patients”? J Man Manip Ther. 2009;17(1):11‐19.[PMC free article] [PubMed]

Evans K Refshauge KM Adams R Aliprandi L Predictors of low back pain in young adult golfers: a preliminary study. Phys Ther Sports. 2005;6:122‐130.

Mellin G Correlations of hip mobility with degree of back pain and lumbar spinal mobility in chronic low‐back pain patients. Spine. June 1988;13(6):668‐670. [PubMed]

Lewis CL, Ferris DP. Walking with Increased Ankle Pushoff Decreases Hip Muscle Moments. Journal of biomechanics. 2008;41(10):2082-2089. doi:10.1016/j.jbiomech.2008.05.013.

Nodehi-Moghadam A, Taghipour M, Goghatin Alibazi R, Baharlouei H. The comparison of spinal curves and hip and ankle range of motions between old and young persons. Medical Journal of the Islamic Republic of Iran. 2014;28:74.

Daniel Moon , MD, MS; Alberto Esquenazi , MD Instrumented Gait Analysis: A Tool in the Treatment of Spastic Gait Dysfunction JBJS Reviews, 2016 Jun; 4 (6): e1. http://dx.doi.org/10.2106/JBJS.RVW.15.00076

Kilbreath SL, Perkins S, Crosbie J, McConnell J. Gluteal taping improves hip extension during stance phase of walking following stroke. Aust J Physiother. 2006;52(1):53-6.

The “Standing on Glass” Static Foot/Pedograph Assessment: Part 1

* note: This is a static assessment dialogue. One cannot, and must not, make clinical decisions from a static assessment. As in all assessments, information is taken in, digested and them MUST be confirmed, denied and/or at the very least, folded into a functional and clinically relevant assessment of the client before the findings are accepted, dismissed and acted upon. As we always say, a gait analysis or pedograph-type assessment is never enough to make decisions on treatment to resolve problems and injuries. What is seen and represented on either are the client’s strategies around clinical problems or compensations.  Today’s photo and blog post are an exercise in critical clinical thinking to get the juices flowing and to get the observer thinking about the client’s presentation and to help open up the field to questions the observer should be entertaining.  The big questions should be, “why do i see this, what could be causing these observances ?”

* note the right and left sides by the R and L circled in pink.

ORANGE lines: The right foot appears to be shorter, or is it that the left is longer (see the lines and arrows drawing your attention to these differences)? A shorter foot could be represented by a supinated foot (if you raise the arch via the windlass mechanism you will shorten the foot distance between the rear and forefoot). A longer foot could be represented by a more pronated foot.  Is that what we have here ? There is no way to know, this is a static presentation of a client standing on glass. What we should remember is that the goal is always to get the pelvis square and level.  If an anatomically or functionally short leg is present, the short leg side MAY supinate to raise the mortise and somewhat lengthen the leg.  In that same client, they may try to meet the process part way by pronating the other foot to functionally “shorten” that leg.  Is that what is happening here ? So, does this client have a shorter right leg ? Longer left ?  Do you see a plunking down heavily onto the right foot in gait ? Remember, what you see is their compensation.  Perhaps the right foot is supinating, and thus working harder at the bottom end of the limb (via more supination), to make up for a weak right glute failing to eccentrically control the internal spin of the leg during stance phase ? OR, perhaps the left foot is pronating more to drive more internal rotation on the left limb because there is a restricted left internal hip rotation from the top ? Is the compensation top-down or bottom up ? These are all viable possibilities and you must have these things flowing freely through your head during the clinical examination as you rule in/rule out your hands-on findings.  Remember, just going by a FMS-type screen to drive prescription exercises from what you see on a movement screen is not going to necessarily fix the problem, it could in fact lead one to drive a deeper compensation pattern. You can be sure that Gray Cook’s turbo charged brain is juggling all of these issues (and more !) when he sees a screen impairment, although we are not speaking for him here.

Remember this critical fact.  After an injury or a long standing problem, muscles and motor patterns jobs are to stabilize and manage loads (stability and mobility) for adequate and necessary movement. Injuries leave a mark on the system as a whole because adaptation was necessary during the initial healing phase. This usually spills over during the early movement re-introduction phase, particularly if movement is reintroduced too early or too aggressively.  Plasticity is the culprit. Just because the injury has come and gone does not mean that new patterns of skill, endurance, strength (S.E.S -our favorite mnemonic), stability and mobility were not subsequently built onto the apparently trivial remnants of the injury.  There is nothing trivial if it is abnormal. The forces must, and will, play out somewhere in the body and this is often where pain or injury occurs but it is rarely where the underlying problem lives.

Come back tomorrow, where we will open your mind into the yellow, pink, blue and lime markings on the photo. Are the hammering toes (lime) on the left a clue ? How about the width of the feet (yellow) ? The posturing differences of the 5th toe to the lateral foot border ?  What about the static plantar pressure differences from side to side (blue)? Maybe, just maybe, we can bring a logical clinical assumption together and then a few clinical exam methods to confirm or dis-confirm our working diagnostic assumption.  See you tomorrow friends !

Shawn and ivo, the gait guys