Stretching: Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced Neural Inhibition Techniques

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Clinical Orthopedic Manual Therapy (COMT): Stretching is a 2-day hands-on workshop that is part of the COMT Certification – Skillset Approach Program offered by Dr. Joe Muscolino. The goal of the COMT Skillset Approach Certification is to reinforce and hone essential COMT assessment and treatment skills, thereby strengthening your level of critical thinking and effectiveness of practice.

Stretching is one of the two fundamental skillsets of COMT. Learning to stretch the muscles (myofascial tissues) of the body is not a matter of having stretching protocols presented and then memorizing them. Rather, there is a science and an art to stretching. COMT: Stretching is a 2-day (16-hour; 16 CE credit hours awarded by the NCBTMB) hands-on workshop that teaches the science and art of stretching muscles; in other words, COMT: Stretching teaches how to stretch. With this workshop, you will sharpen and master how to do muscle stretching so that you are empowered to reason through how to effectively stretch each and every muscle of the body, with each of the various stretching techniques that exist. The approach of this workshop is to teach from the perspective of critical thinking in a hands-on setting so that you can creatively apply the technique for clinical orthopedic work on your patients/clients.

During the workshop, we will practice and perfect muscle stretching protocols for all the musculature of the body. Specifically, we will learn and workshop static versus dynamic stretching, therapist-assisted and client self-care stretching, pin and stretch technique, as well as advanced neural inhibition (contract relax/CR, postisometric relaxation/PIR, proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation/PNF, agonist contract/AC, and contract relax agonist contract/CRAC) stretching techniques. We will also discuss stretching as a length-assessment technique, not simply a treatment technique. And we will discuss how to integrate stretching into your manual therapy treatment sessions.

We will hone these skills by actually workshopping stretching for many of the muscles of the body, including some of the major muscles of concern such as the psoas major, quadratus lumborum, piriformis, rotator cuff group, hip flexor group, posterior extensor muscles of the neck, pectoralis minor, and the scalenes and longus muscles of the anterior neck, as well as many others.

This workshop will build mastery and confidence in your stretching skills. Coupling the mastery of stretching with the mastery of soft tissue manipulation (massage) skills will lift your clinical orthopedic manual therapy practice to a new level!

COMT: Orthopedic Assessment Testing is part of the COMT Skillset Approach Certification.

The five courses are:
Palpation Assessment
Orthopedic Assessment Testing
Body Mechanics for the Therapist
Stretching: Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced Neural Inhibition Techniques
Arthrofascial Stretching: Grade IV Joint Mobilization for the Manual Therapist