Kim Webster, Rolfing Reno

07/28/2024

In Reno, Wednesday, November 6th, 2024. So cool!

03/25/2024

Pre-Achilles / Kager’s Fat Pad: Analysis by Physio Meets Science

“The space created from the Achilles tendon posteriorly and the tibia anteriorly is known as Kager’s triangle and is occupied by a mass of adipose tissue called Kager’s fat pad.

👉 It is located in the posterior ankle joint, bordered by the Achilles tendon posteriorly, the crural fascia and flexor hallucis longus (FHL) muscle anteriorly, and the posterior calcaneal tuberosity at its base inferiorly.

☑️ This seemingly innocuous structure functions importantly in several ways. Given a high density of sensory nerve endings, Kager’s fat pad likely contributes to proprioception [https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15702331/].

☑️ It functions mechanically to reduce friction between the Achilles tendon and the tibia acts as a shock-absorber in the ankle. [https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31256217/]

☑️Additionally, it fills an otherwise potential space, serving to prevent the buildup of negative pressure in the bursa during plantarflexion and to prevent kinking of the tendon during plantarflexion [https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16420382/].

☑️ It also protects nutrient vessels that course through the fat pad to supply the tendon. [https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-45594-0_1]

💡Pingel and colleagues revealed that Kager’s fat pad might play an important role in the pathology of chronic achilles tendinopathy (AT). Expression of several inflammatory markers was up-regulated together with altered lipid metabolism in the Kager’s fat pad of AT patients.” [https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25996876/]

Photo Credit: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-35989-7_21

Sagittal section of the ankle. Posterior detail.
1 Calcaneal or Achilles tendon
2 Retrocalcaneal bursa
3 Posterosuperior part of the calcaneus
4 Kager’s fat pad or pre-Achilles fat pad
5 Subcutaneous bursa
6 Bone spur in the insertional Achilles tendinopathy
7 Flexor hallucis muscle belly
8 Ankle joint
9 Subtalar joint

- Physio Meets Science

01/16/2023

~ THE HEART IS NOT A PUMP ~

Many of us live under the medical myth that the heart is a pump, an idea borne of an industrialised culture that views the body as a machine.

The heart however is so much more beautiful and fascinating than we ever could have imagined!

“Modern analysis of the heart has shown that in spite of the fact that the most powerful ventricle of the heart can shoot water six feet into the air, the amount of pressure actually needed to force the blood through the entire length of the body’s blood vessels would have to be able to lift a one hundred pound weight one mile high” - Stephen Buhner

So how does the blood move around the labyrinth-like vessels of our body?

It moves of its own accord.

You see, blood flow is not a simple stream like we once thought.

It is in fact composed of two streams, spiralling around each other much like the image of a DNA double helix, at the centre of which is a vacuum.

“Blood flow through living vessels is much more like a tornado than anything else: Such a vacuum is necessary for producing a vortex” - Stephen Buhner

How cool is that?

This spiral dance is not only found in the bloodstream, but also in the blood cell itself!

Blood cell’s in fact spin on their own individual axes of rotation. They are smaller spinning cells in a larger spinning vortex.

If your mind is not blown yet, let’s go back to the heart.

The heart itself has recently been discovered not to be a mass of muscle, but rather a ‘helicoidal myocardial band’ that has spiralled in upon itself, creating its unique shape and its separate chambers.

This is called the Helical Heart, and you can see doctors unravel it by searching ‘Helical Heart’ on Youtube.

Pair this with discoveries that the heart functions as an endocrine gland, has its own nervous system that makes and releases its own neurotransmitters, and emits an electromagnetic field that is far stronger than the brain’s, and we begin to move from the idea that the heart is simply a mechanical pump.

It is a spiralling organ of perception.

If that’s not beautiful, we don’t know what is!

Incredible Art by Gabriel Keleman

Evidence-Based Research:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16373590/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11807730/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24209915/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7712215/

Watch them un-ravel the Heart here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbOyozg_GTs&ab_channel=somanaut

THIS POST WRITTEN BY NIMBIN APOTHECARY
Follow them here:
https://m.facebook.com/NimbinApothecary/

Nimbin Apothecary has been providing herbs and health support to Nimbin for over 30 years!

05/09/2022

❓ How reliable is my MRI ❓
It has been said that a picture is worth 1,000 words. But what if the picture was an MRI and those words resulted in increased harm, medical overuse, and a cascade of events leading to more pain and disability.

Unfortunately, MRI’s have been a gold standard diagnostic tool for many orthopedic conditions. However, in this simple case study you can see the high variability and inconsistencies with one individual receiving 10 MRIs at 10 different testing sites.

MRIs are great at ruling out any significant and dangerous red flags such as tumors and fractures, but never justify the pain a person is experiencing.

An MRI is simply a small pixel in the grand picture of your life. Via

01/22/2022

Rolfing is a technique people who live with chronic pain may not have tried yet to find relief. We cover seven things people with chronic pain should know about Rolfing. We share how it’s different from a deep tissue massage and what to expect when you sign up for Rolfing sessions with a certified...

09/12/2021

With better drugs and stem-cell therapies, researchers hope to repair cartilage—or prevent damage—before osteoarthritis sets in or an operation is needed.

05/27/2021

03/01/2021

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/02/26/science/reopen-schools-safety-ventilation.html?action=click&module=Top+Stories&pgtype=Homepage&fbclid=IwAR1ovCjBnhuXtenZ7lr6Jbn8b_iWB-sBmpWmhs7L1dVdMhPhdLBTePoM4xI

A simulation of airflow in a real New York City classroom shows how simple ventilation and filtration can reduce the probability of coronavirus exposure.

01/24/2021

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/22/arts/dance/somatic-practices-during-the-pandemic.html?fbclid=IwAR3fgBG4gHoOnhOVNJs0OGjk-4YA2AiJ8b2Xtd3s4hmJMJk65x-Abe0CSVs

It’s cold outside. The pandemic is getting worse. It’s time to look inward with the help of movement practices that create healthy bodies and minds.

12/01/2020

Another great visual. In reading these quotes, imagine what Ida Rolf is talking about. Try to feel it in your body.

"Competence in any field, muscular or otherwise, is expressed in beauty and characterized by grace. Psoas quality manifests itself in stance and gait. Standing, which is the zero limit of balanced movement, makes demands on the psoas. In moving, walking or flexing, the abdominal surface (obliques as well as recti) adjusts with the easy, resilient sliding that characterizes free muscles. In movement, walking or flexing, we reiterate, the belly wall does not billow forward or slump forward—it falls back. This elicits a sophisticated grace of movement that, in a dancer, is a delight; in the average workaday citizen, it is a benchmark of personal excellence that gives him unending satisfaction as well as physical ease. He becomes aware of himself as an integrated man—he and his body are one.

Sadly enough, the psoas is too often unable to play a suitable part. In the random individual, it tends to be structurally retired, glued to the pelvic brim. It does not participate in the gait of the average person. Athletic training emphasizes repetitious movement of outer muscles at the expense of the inner (intrinsic); the psoas, more central to the body than the re**us abdominis, succumbs more rapidly to inappropriate exercise.

In walking, skiing, dancing— any motor activity of the legs—the average man will flex by shortening the re**us femoris. Abdication of the psoas in favor of either the re**us femoris or the re**us abdominis is undesirable. The structure as well as the function of the psoas is unique; no other myofascial element can substitute satisfactorily.

Some strands originate in the trunk itself at the lateral margin of the twelfth dorsal vertebra. By the time the muscle attaches at the lesser trochanter of the femur (thigh), it has reinforced the lumbar spine, traversed the pelvis, and crossed the p***s. In this way, the psoas unifies torso with thigh.

Sturdy, balanced walking (in which the leg is flexed through activation of the psoas, not of the re**us femoris) thus involves the entire body at its core level. In such walking, each step is initiated at the twelfth dorsal vertebra, not in the legs; the legs move subsequently. Let us be clear about this: the legs do not originate movement in the walk of a balanced body; the legs support and follow. Movement is initiated in the trunk and transmitted to the legs through the medium of the psoas."

Rolfing pages: 118 - 119

08/17/2020

THE VAGUS NERVE
⠀
A seemingly never-ending branching nerve that connects most of our major organs to our brain 🧠.
⠀
It’s the longest cranial nerve in our body, one for the right side and one for the left. And is largely responsible for the connection for its role as a mediator between thinking and feeling, you know our “gut feeling.”
⠀
The vagus nerve is the “queen” of the parasympathetic nervous system. The “rest and digest” or the nerve. So the more we do things to activate the nerve (like deep ), the most we combat the effects of its opposer, the sympathetic nervous system - the “fight or flight”, rushing around, have to do something, releasing one.
⠀
A few other functions of the vagus nerve, just to name a few:
▪️slows your heart rate and respiration.
▪️lowers blood pressure.
▪️helps with calmness and relaxation.
▪️controls involuntary muscles in the digestive system, therefore, aiding digestion.
▪️taste sensation.
▪️movement function for the muscles in the neck responsible for swallowing and speech.
▪️gut-brain communication.
▪️reduces inflammation.
⠀

05/29/2020

05/26/2020

Dance Informa speaks with Sue Mayes and Andrew Pilcher, two leading dance specialist physiotherapists, about stretching for dancers.

04/20/2020

Thanks to our friend Dr. Eric Cobb, founder of Z-health. If you're not familiar with his work, please do yourself a favor and watch a couple of his YouTube videos...you'll be hooked. One of the first since Moshe Feldenkrais to do brain-based movement training. Check out this link: https://www.youtube.com/user/ZHealthPerformance

04/20/2020

SUBSCRIBE: http://bit.ly/2fle0WB FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/fxnlmedia WEBSITE: https://fxnlmedia.com Nerve pain - including sciatica and thoracic out...

03/22/2020

From Ron Murray, “Don’t forget the basics.”