Telehealth
This is a virtual appointment option for those who are unable to attend an in person appointment. Your therapist will spend the same amount of time with you as with an in person appointment. Your appointment will include:
- A thorough subjective history and an objective assessment. NOTE: make sure to set up your camera in a space with good light, space, and wear appropriate clothing so your therapist can watch you move.
- Education on your injury, plan for treatment including a corrective exercise program, referrals as indicated, and self management strategies.
Blood Flow Restriction training
This involves using a pneumatic cuff placed around the desired limb to allow a client to train at low loads, but receive similar benefits compared to training at higher loads. For the ideal patient, this is a great way to maintain or improve muscle mass if the client is recovering from injury and unable to load heavier within the first 6-8 weeks or beyond.
Blood flow restriction has many benefits for helping restore or maintain bone, tendon, ligament or muscle health, and can be used both with cardiovascular or resistance training for certain individuals. It also has been used to prime muscles within the athletic population prior to competition.
Please discuss the use of BFR training with your health care professional during or before your appointment for more detail and to discuss if this modality would be safe and affective to use as part of your treatment.
Climbing movement assessment
Watching someone climb is an integral part of both injury prevention and helping to determine the cause of a climbing injury, particularly if their pain is related to a repetitive overuse injury or they are unsure of a specific cause.
There are also specific tests for overall strength, endurance, mobility, and control that can be performed to see how you measure up compared to norms, and help a climber decide on areas to focus on specific to their training to improve performance and prevent injury.
Our physiotherapist, Kayla, is trained in climbing movement and performance assessment. Movement assessment involves either with the eye, or by way of video analysis, assessing your climbing movement patterns when climbing near your maximum, and determine suboptimal mechanics or movement patterns that could lead to injury. Performance assessment involves specific off the wall tests.
She can then provide you with some corrective exercises and climbing drills to help improve movement patterns and reduce prevalence of a specific injury.