Science

2021 Summer Semester Class in Review

What an honor to be invited to teach PRI for a 6-week summer selective course at High Point University this past May-June to PT students in their third year!  A big “Thank You!” to the staff at HPU and especially to Dr. Dora Gosselin, PT, DPT, PCS, C/NDT, former student, and colleague of mine for the invitation!  Seventeen eager students chose this selective and did a fantastic job receiving the science. They asked thoughtful questions and provided helpful feedback at the course end.

In six 4-hour classes, we were able to get through the concepts of Asymmetrical Human Design, Respiratory Zone of Apposition (ZOA), Neutrality, Right-Sided Dominance, Alternation, Respiration, Lateralization, and an Introduction to Scoliosis. We tackled 9 PRI tests and 15 non-manual techniques in 8 hours of lab.  We ended with 2 assignments to give them an opportunity to explore and apply the science of PRI.  They dove into the literature to see if they could find, review, and then present an article that compared the right side to the left side of the human body in any area of PT.  Then, they applied their new knowledge by performing 3 PRI tests and 3 non-manual techniques followed by PRI re-testing to identify changes to a human body of their choice.  These two projects/class presentations served to be learning experiences from which we all benefitted.

I was very lucky and grateful to have the incomparable Dr. Jennifer Smart as a lab TA with me on non-manual technique day!  The students’ learning experience was audibly enriched by her presence! Thank you, Jen!

Finally, thank you to Ron Hruska and Jen Platt, founder, and executive director, respectively, and the Board of Directors of the Institute for allowing me to use PRI materials for teaching, for their generous support, as well as for creating the science!

We are hopeful to be able to teach more students again next year!  Thanks again, Dr. Gosselin and staff, for welcoming me into your state-of-the-art technology classroom fully equipped with treatment tables and anything else an instructor could want!  What an awesome experience!

Posted July 29, 2021 at 8:24PM
Categories: Science

This workshop was a first for Jen Platt and I. Opening the workshop with discussion on corollary consequence, correspondence and compensation allowed us to “look” at the top-down influences of PRI Corollary Movement in each of the 12 secondary and tertiary techniques that Jen chose for us to cover. She did a great job in organizing these techniques, laying them out and selecting techniques that offered the attendee a wide perspective of application. Normally, we do not list testimonials after a course.  (You can find testimonials by courses by going to the ‘Programs and Courses’ site on our website).  However, after reading the feedback that Hannah compiled, I felt it would be helpful for those who may be interested in taking this course in the future, as well as to read what the ‘first-time’ attendees had to say about it.

 “I have already listened to at least 60% of the course material. I cannot tell you how much it helps to have the content available to go over again. This course put so many things together in regard to patterning. There were so many lightbulb moments into why things may fall apart for the patient at home with their exercise program because of the brain influence in regard to patterning. The word sense is so different than finding and feeling. Sensing something different in the body especially when sensing one thing can help the patient sense another area is HUGE in regard to making a program successful. Walking away from this course has had one of the most dramatic effects on putting the whole picture together, especially with the ability to go back and review it again. I hope that you can continue to offer the courses on zoom. I also wonder if any of the other recorded courses that were offered through zoom could ever be available as a take home course. It is nice to have that available as an option. Also wondering if Ron was ever going to put all the 33 corollary exercises together now that we understand the corollaries. I know that the other exercises are from other courses but we never had the corollaries with them. Thank you again for everything you all do!!!!”

“This course will allow me to progress all of my clients over the coming months and was a fantastic guide in sensory integration that I felt was a missing puzzle piece.”

“I have learned it in neuroanatomy but only in an abstract manner - now it becomes more meaningful for my work. Thanks!”

“I've always known the importance of multi sensory "sense", but this took my understanding a step further for sure”

“It feels like this course was a missing puzzle piece in my application. This made it much more straightforward to progress and cue clients”

“1. Greater confidence with technique selection 2. Deeper understanding & appreciation re: critiquing and cueing for a clients understanding of both positional and integrative sense”

“This course material will likely allow me help clients move to a higher level of motor learning much more efficiently and with less cognitive load (corollaries > references) especially in a fitness setting, but obviously also with rehab clients.”

“This is one of the MOST relevant courses offered by PRI to my area of practice in my opinion, moving away from more "attention intensive" movement practices towards integrated sense of corollaries will allow all of my clients, from pro athlete to rehab, to experience and sense the task at hand rather than trying to juggle a more cueing intensive task.”

“Thank you again for supporting the growth of PRI nation. We love you and this course was fantastic. When entering a black hole, one needs a guide named Ron Hruska. I can feel the effort, the labor of love, the hard work that has been put into this course (and all other courses). Thank you PRI team for continuing to lead the way. You inspire me to be better. Much love from Alpine PT in Seattle.”

I could not give this course, the way it was presented, without the direct input, production, and guidance that Jen provide both me and the audience. So grateful for her many roles she plays in this Institute, but now, because we know each other so well and the overall intent so well, the delivery and message is seamless, sincere and solid. This truly was the Institute’s first multisensory movement workshop that reflected the strength of the corollary movement sense needed for natural cognitive processing built around vestibular-ocular reflexive correlations. We also could not have made this workshop the ‘virtual reality’ workshop it was without the live presence of Amy Morris, PT, Phil DeNigris, CSCS, Rua Gilna, CPT, SFG1, PN1, and Dave Drummer, DPT, PRC. Their patience with my Socratic style of teaching and their willingness to objectively communicate what they felt, sensed, experienced and struggled with made multi-dimensional processing understandable and appreciable.

Thank you again for coming to Lincoln and participate in the manner in which each and every one of you did.  

Posted June 22, 2021 at 8:31PM
Categories: Courses Techniques Science

I really do not believe there is any non-PRI course that introduces and integrates the right brain with the left brain for forward movement, forward based anticipation, forward hemispheric automaticity, and forward movement dependency on patterned lateralized sense of flow, developed around the visual system, hemi-chest cavities, upper and lower extremities, like this one. I take in consideration the primary course references, as the Forward Locomotor Clinical Corollaries are considered, in the selection of one of ten eccentric left hamstring or right quadricep bi-hemispheric PRI techniques that are considered for forward locomotor movement (FLM) efficiency.
Simply put, I hope that those who attended this tertiary course will be able to preserve forward propulsion through panoptic imagery and cortical documentation, chest decompression and cortical documentation, upper extremity lift and cortical documentation, and lower extremity push and cortical documentation, with those who are having difficulty recognizing exchange from these bi-hemispheric senses. My exasperation of “Please write this down, even if it’s only in your head”, is my way of saying “please sense these cortical documentary journaling” that are required for left hemispheric functional logic and right hemispheric gestalt, structured around these four FLM components.

Forward Locomotor Movement, PRI Gait Cycle, Gait, Postural Restoration Tertiary Course, Ron Hruska


It was a wonderful two days of exchange between 50 plus attendees. And I enjoyed every minute talking about the facts behind limb movement and pendular displacement that’s necessary for us to ‘walk”.
As I write this today, my seventh grandchild and my first granddaughter, Vivien walked for her first time, ten complete FLM cycles, without support. The video makes her grandfather smile because her 13-month-old brain and body, represents the human lateralized hemispheric components of forward movement that gives her the intra personal and inter personal gifts of life she will use to perfect her FLM personality and patterned pendular print. She felt flow, freedom, fun and fifial love.

Posted June 15, 2021 at 5:00PM
Categories: Courses Science

The "flagship" course in PRI is Postural Respiration because how and where air enters our body facilitates how the rest of the body performs. This is a very dense course with a lot of research and neurology behind the musculoskeletal ramifications of faulty airflow patterns. The huge advantage this live-stream course provided is the ability of the course attendee to go back and listen to the course material again for two weeks. We were fortunate to have a few in-person attendees as well as many on-line live streaming attendees.

I've had the pleasure of teaching via live-stream several times since March of last year. However, this was the first course I've taught that had a lab component since November 2019. It was very rewarding and refreshing to have the opportunity to interact with in-person humans again during a PRI course. I have missed the human interaction while teaching PRI. I know that all of the PRI faculty feel the exact same way; Ron probably more than any of us. It was a very enjoyable experience.

90-90 Hip Lift, Postural Restoration, Postural Respiration

We were able to dive deep into the neurological ramifications of human asymmetry, the potential role of dynamic respiration, and the potential negative affects of patterned respiration. Once we were able to fully delve into neurology of respiration, the AIC and BC patterns relative to respiration became a more fluid learning experience. The discussion around the left diaphragm's need for a team of muscles to assist in its endeavor to perform inhalation as well as the rib and sternal mechanics behind trunk rotation were topics of conversation that provided lively questions and conversation. These conversations permitted a deeper explanation into how and why Superior T4 Syndrome develops, as well as how to assess and manage it.  

The goal was to provide the attendee as much information as possible without overwhelming the new-to-PRI attendee. This opportunity is afforded to us by the live-stream event. With time to go back and listen to the information to help digest and understand topics that may be challenging or difficult, we are able to go a little deeper and a little faster into these concepts.

   

This course is different and has evolved over the last few years. If you haven't attended Postural Respiration in the past, or haven't attended in a while, I would recommend finding a way, sooner than later, doing so because of the many upgrades to this "flagship" course.

Posted May 27, 2021 at 4:10PM
Categories: Courses Science

We all know someone who experience difficulties with simple movements and at the same time can move or carry out, what appears to be more complex movements easily. This phenomenon of ‘Kinesia Paradoxa’ is one that is often seen with individuals who have been diagnosed with a basal ganglia disease called Parkinson’s Disease. However, by studying basal ganglia diseases we can learn so much about the precursors and the stages of this disease and its developmental patterns and symptomology. I believe, I have been on a journey of researching coupling and identifying similarities in people who have oscillator conflict at the caudate nucleus and putamen or dorsal striatum, at the subthalamic nucleus, at the globus pallidus, and at the substantial nigra pars reticulata, and didn’t really know it. For this is where the majority of our paradoxical function really begins, is initiated and looped. For these are the areas that make up the basal ganglia. Ganglia that reflect the parts of the brain that are not often even thought about, when sequencing steps in a “exercise”, or movement technique.

I always enjoy the amount of time, energy, thought and ideas that go into these PRI Symposiums. Ideas, that flow far in advance of the actual delivery of material and madness. I love every moment of these preparatory mental madness moments. Because that is what is exactly going on in our basal ganglia. Frenzied, chaotic, pandemonium mayhem, that can lead to periods of deranged decisions or a flow of indiscreet ideas. It’s the latter that we would never experience if we were controlled by frequencies of neuro-synapses that didn’t loop with other unfamiliar neuroreceptors, once in a while; like every 10 milliseconds.

Ron Hruska, Basal Ganglia Disease, Annual Symposium, Parkinson's Disease

Click HERE to view the full photo album.

There is a fine line between sanity and conflict. I personally need both in my life, and I am fairly certain you do too. Jennifer Smart DPT, PRC, Neal Hallinan CSCS, LMT, PRT and myself put a manual together, delivered content, and digressed into areas that reflect ideology of some of our most important ganglia we have. We enjoyed the time together in this presentation of ideas, in the preparation of ideas, and in the exchange of ideas that will hopefully strengthen the balance of movement associated with asymmetrical sanity and movement associated with symmetrical conflict. We, the speakers, learned so much from each other and the science that actually does support our zaniness and Zen-like ideas, all because of our respect for life’s paradoxes.

Here are a few of the comments we received from the class participants/attendees:

“Yes the material outlined "bigger picture" neurological influences on all humans that manifest as pathology in some. All people will benefit from this mindset of looking at human neurological function.”

“Love that these symposiums build on prior knowledge and become useful not as cookbook ways of treating patients but as ways to understand human behavior and provide frameworks to improve outcomes for all humans.”

“It brought the new perspective in how I look at Parkinsons and how big Inhibition is!”

“Just one fun thing. I was talking to my almost 91 year old mother who now uses a Rollator and she was asking about a stand up walker the night the course ended. Her next statement was funny (no knowledge of the course) and she said that the main thing she missed in her walking was "swinging her arms". I went down and worked with her with swinging hiking sticks in her hands (except I was using 2 reachers) and progressed her to using a trowel and hand clippers and she walked about 60 feet 4 times (back and forth in her driveway) unassisted and non stop. Cannot express how much fun it was to give her some freedom (she still loves to garden). Thank you all for a fantastic event as always. It is great to be able to go back an implement changes in my patients.”

“It felt balanced between the three presenters. I felt that Jennifer utilized her time the best, she did a good job of communicating her work, her experience, research, and I am grateful for her efforts. All presenters did an excellent job. Ron helped me to appreciate the basal ganglia, I really had never thought about this part of the brain in my day to day life and now it is imprinted. Neal was very engaging and enthusiastic, His passion moved me to appreciate dance and rhythm in a whole new way.”

“This Symposium was over flowing with important information about a new way of thinking for working with all our patients or clients, not just those with Parkinson's disease.”

“This was a great course to expand my knowledge of Basal Ganglia disease and treatment options. I have been certified in the LSVT BIG program for years but would also like to branch out and have other options for my patients. This course gave me lots of ideas”

The last comment above summarizes our basal ganglia’s ability to keep us resonating with bombardment of relaying information that allow us to flow with “lots of ideas” that are recognized and required for satisfactory frontal cortex creativity. And if we don’t occasionally fulfill our dopaminergic ideas, that we create, generate and plan, we may just be laying down the framework for future unplanned kinesia paradoxa, that we want to avoid.

Posted May 5, 2021 at 3:34PM
Categories: Courses Clinicians Science

Earlier this month, I was in Fort Collins, CO teaching Pelvis Restoration after 14 months out of the faculty circuit. For many reasons that will prove impossible to come close to articulating here, this course in review proved difficult to concisely write. These past two years, objectively, I have lost a lot—a child to disease, a dear co-worker to miscommunication, contact with a dear friend and colleague to culture, contact with another dear friend and colleague to a series of business casualties...to name a few. I mention these losses because I am certain this same window has been uniquely difficult year for most everyone reading this, regardless of where you find yourself. I’m sorry for each of your losses, yet very much hopeful.

Just through that window, I take heart, because I am confident that all of these losses are temporary, and will prove to be blessings, each in their own way, though I may not understand how presently. For certain, goodness was found in Fort Collins!  It is also difficult to encapsulate how thankful I am for my good, longtime friend and colleague Craig Depperschmidt, a 2012 PRC graduate and PRI hub in Colorado, to have welcomed me back to Fort Collins with undeserving hospitality. It was tremendous working with newer friends Brian Benjamin, who served tremendously as host site coordinator, as well as Rachel Kroncke, Sara Truelsen, and Ruth Waller-Liddle in the ProActive PT Center family who welcomed PRI and me into their work home fully. Thank you each so much for your warm welcome!

Pelvis Restoration course on asymetrical pelvic influence

Pelvis Restoration course on asymetrical influences of the pelvis

The course was akin to being back on one’s favorite horse—saddle and content were true and just as they should be. Many thanks to Matthew McLaughlin for great discussion during the course and during break times. Thank you to Jason Huang, Ryan LaFountaine, Jessica Robinson, Cristi Cuellar and multiple others for your help with demonstration during lab sessions as we explored the many facets of this primary course about a pelvic inlet and outlet. Many interactions during both lecture and lab about clinical application hopefully proved beneficial to experienced veteran course participants and to the six-pack of those new to the science of PRI. This instructor enjoyed the respectful and vigorous participation from the class as we discussed optimizing neuromechanical position and triplanar control of hemipelvic inlets and outlets in order to allow alternating integrated function of synchronized ipsilateral pelvic and thoracic diaphraghms. Thank you all from ProActive PT and PRI who made this course possible once again, it really was and is good to be back!

It was a wonderful weekend teaching a Pelvis Restoration as a “hybrid" course. Teaching to professionals attending the course in person and through Zoom was exciting and humbling. Thank you to everyone who attended. Your desire to learn and passion for the Science of PRI is amazing. We had great questions and interaction through both forums this past weekend. We had energy. We had passion. We had a desire to learn. I felt an improved understanding of the “external” support of the pelvis with tri-planar movement (especially the frontal plane) was understood at a deeper level for improved regulation of internal pressure and airflow. I felt course attendees appreciated the PRI objective tests and how they can assist them clinically to improve PRI Non-Manual Techniques selection for patient treatment. I also felt in insight was also gained in not only “re-positioning” the pelvis but then “re-training” that pelvis for left stance and right swing with our goal to “restore” for reciprocal and alternating movement.

We were “world-wide” this past weekend with course attendees from all across the U.S. and internationally. Thank you again for all that came. It was great to teach as it makes me a better clinician.

Posted April 21, 2021 at 4:36PM

After almost a year to the day of the country shutting down, this course marked a refreshing beginning to some normalcy with teaching PRI Myokinematic Restoration again. We had at least 50 participants virtually with attendees in and outside of the U.S. ranging all the way from Canada, Slovenia, and the UK. We had 9 in person attendees that made the trek to Lincoln and served as the “models” for our myokinematic lab portion.

We began the first morning with didactic material learning all about the patterns of the L AIC. This  included non pathology and pathology discussions in relation to the compensatory demands of the femur in the acetabulum. Respiration demands, underlying neurology and asymmetry helped to shape and understand the reasoning behind the L AIC pattern.

The weekend concluded with an ample amount of lab and hands on time, learning to assess position of the hip, compensatory findings, and frontal plane performance testing with the Hruska ADDuction test and Hruska ABDuction test. The attendees then went through myokinematic techniques to restore and retrain pathomechanics of the pelvis.

We had several thought provoking questions and the enthusiasm was great from the group and could be felt even virtually!

Posted April 1, 2021 at 4:58PM
Categories: Courses Techniques Science

The Midwest started warming up to a balmy 22 degrees on the way to reaching almost above freezing on Saturday morning for the first Postural Respiration Live/Live Stream course this year. There were seven live attendees some of whom drove over 5 hours on slick and icy roads to take their first Postural Respiration course while almost 40 others from all over the country, and even internationally from Slovenia, attended this course. Ron and I had a discussion the day before I taught and it was a real inspiration to be able to emphasize to the new students the concepts of not just rib movement and diaphragm function but the importance of pressure and flow inside a chest wall and how that not only affects position and posture but every system in the human body. We spend a lot of time on the orthopedic consequences of neurologic patterns in this course but it is what is inside the chest wall in terms of how we direct air into chambers and how that affects whether ribs move up or move down, and torsos left or right as a critical element of Postural Respiration and all PRI courses. The Posterior Mediastinum has become more of an emphasis than ever before along with the role of the first rib in initiating the lifting of the rest of the ribs below it during respiration. This class really got the relationship between the right apical chest wall and the left posterior mediastinum with the role of how important inhibition to these chambers of the chest wall is.

One of the non manual techniques we focused on was the Standing Serratus Squat and the importance of learning how to perform it. This is one of PRI's more difficult positions to competently perform and that there are often precursors, especially with reaching and squatting techniques, to help facilitate this most important technique. Just because it is challenging to perform doesn't mean that students shouldn't master it and then teach their patients. This is one of many techniques that help strengthen an individual's diaphragm and give them a "sense", which was one of the key words of the weekend, of thier ribcage moving backwards!

And for forward locomotion, that is, to move forward, one most move a ribcage back! Questions came in fast and furious which is a delight for instructors since it helps to gauge where the attendees are in their understanding and to reinforce and repeat concepts that are needed to provide a good foundation to understand this course well enough to begin to apply. The students in this course were helping teach Postural Respiration by their re-states and questions with energy and enthusiasm. Shout out Meghann Vanslager and Jennifer Bacon who drove from Kansas then had a 5 hour drive home with work the next day! Thanks to Ian Katanec for being on a 9 hour time difference in Slovenia and everyone else that spent their weekend with us as over half of the attendees that were either brand new to PRI or first time attending Postural Respiration. Most of all, thanks to RJ Hruska who was my wingman performing audio and visual expertise with changing camera angles for lab and keeping things going smoothly during these virtual attendance times.

Posted March 3, 2021 at 9:07PM
Categories: Courses Techniques Science

There are four kinds of documentation that most of us use to change our behavior:  
1)  Learning oriented tutorials.
 2) Goal oriented how-to guides.
3) Understanding-orientated discussions.
4) And, information-oriented reference material.


Each of these four types of documentations usually have instances within the document that refers to related information elsewhere in the same document. This is important as it forms a network structure of relations that exist between different parts of data, dictionary-internal as well as dictionary-external. If the cross-reference mechanism is well designed, visibly or technically, the reader, and in this case, the course attendee, will be able to follow each and apply ‘cross-reference’ event, to the referenced content whether the content is presented visibly or technically.  


The last example, of the four listed above, enhances usability and application of content in each of the PRI Non-Manual Techniques. Documentation or description that identifies direct reference and referent sites of consistent interest; is required so documentation that indirectly implicates cross references from these and other discrete or unconsidered sites can provide content-strategies to meet the desired needs and expectations, from both the provider and the participant.


As the author of these techniques, and as the author of cross-referencing design associated with each technique, effort to ensure that location and content of the target of the cross-reference in each technique needs to be consistent, regardless of the aptness of the provider or the participant.  


These opportunities to provide my reasoning behind each of the techniques, that were selected by this course’s participants, are not exceeded in any other course offered in PRI. Therefore, the guidance I offer to answer questions on the ‘why’s, ‘when’s, ‘who’s and ‘what’s regarding each technique’s reference’s, referent’s, and cross-reference’s content, is an absolute unique opportunity for both the author and the attendee seeking behavior modification through documentation that is resourcefully dissected at a level that is unsurpassed in this Institute.  Each technique (documentation) dissection experience is truly one of the most rewarding things I have done in my life.  And I am grateful.

 
I want to thank Dan Houglum, Torin Berge, Dave Drummer, Jen, Hannah and RJ for their assistance in making this course so enjoyable to teach and apply to “real” life limitations and likenesses.

Posted February 4, 2021 at 4:18PM
Categories: Courses Techniques Science
First ... 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 ... Last

Products

CD Bundles
Non-manual Techniques
Manual Techniques DVD
Manual Techniques
Illustrations
PRIVY
PRI Video for You