Handy Travel Tips

Going on holiday? Lifting suitcases, sitting for long periods of time and even taking up new sports can cause niggles and strains on your body.

Our team have compiled a handy list of their top tips, to keep you free from pain & injury...just remember to SMILE!

• Stretch every hour, and hold for 5

Reach for the sky …clasp your hands together and stretch your arms above your head
Upper back twist (both ways)….check out who’s behind you (!)
Buttock- stretch your knee to your chest
 

• Move

Get up for a walk as often as you can to reduce the swelling in your ankles and risk of Deep Vein Thrombosis. To increase your blood flow, do leg exercises every hour for 3 minutes: wiggle your toes, pump your ankle up and down, and press the balls of your feet down hard on the floor
 

• Inventory & Packing

Make a list of everything you need before you go, be clever with what you bring:
Only include clothes you can wear at least 3 times – keep them simple and change daywear to evening wear with accessories
Limit the number of books you bring, buy them there or use a tablet
Pack a jumper or small pillow into your carry-on luggage, then fold it into a square and pop it in the small of your back for support when you’re sitting

• Lift and Carry

Use luggage trolleys wherever you can
Keep your carry-on luggage as light as possible, and pull a wheeled bag rather than carrying a shoulder bag. If you use a rucksack, wear it on both shoulders

• Equipment 

Sitting for long periods of time? Use a neck pillow for support – you can also put the pillow on your lap and rest your elbows on it, to take the weight off your arms
Wear comfortable clothes, especially practical shoes which can be removed easily
Throw a tennis ball in your bag – it’s ideal to give yourself a massage if you get tight. Try these exercises: Tennis Ball Self Massage

Remember, you will feel so much better when you reach your destination if you stay hydrated by drinking lots of water….and if you can’t visualise yourself wearing it, don’t pack it!
 

 

For treatment tips and more exercises for long journeys or flights this summer, just give us a call on 0131 556 1116 (Edinburgh) or 0141 332 6000 (Glasgow) to book your appointment. 

Barefoot Running

Barefoot running is a hot topic in the running world at present. Here is a summary and link to some of the research comparing the biomechanics of endurance running.

The average runner strikes the ground 600 x per km making endurance runners prone to repetitive strain injuries. Most injuries occur when the foot collides with the ground. The collision force can be up to 3 x the weight of the runner.

Barefoot runners or those in minimal footwear most commonly land on the forefoot (forefoot strike) before lowering the heel. By comparison habitually shod runners mostly land on the heel (rear-foot strike) due to increased cushioning and elevation of the heel in modern running shoes.

Analysis shows that even on hard surfaces such as a steel plate barefoot runners who fore-foot strike, generate smaller collision forces that rear-foot strikers in modern running shoes. Forefoot strikers land with a plantar-flexed (pointing down) foot resulting in the calf muscles absorbing more force decreasing the effective mass of the body that collides with the ground. Habitual rear-foot strikers land with a dorsi-flexed (pointing up) foot resulting in up to 3 x higher ground reaction force absorbed in the first 50ms of stance than habitually fore-foot strikers.

Although barefoot running may lead to less knee, hip and back problems due to decreased collision forces there is a higher likelihood of achilles, calf and foot problems due to increased loading of these muscles.This is most likely to occur if people try and transition to barefoot running too quickly. The key is to build it up slowly and to be aware of the obvious risks to your foot such as cuts and abrasions.

At present there are no controlled prospective trials to test the hypothesis that barefoot running reduces the incidence of repetitive injury.
The links below are to the Harvard website which carried out the studies and their papers:

http://barefootrunning.fas.harvard.edu/index.html

http://barefootrunning.fas.harvard.edu/Nature2010_FootStrikePatternsandCollisionForces.pdf

http://barefootrunning.fas.harvard.edu/Nature2004_EnduranceRunningandtheEvolutionofHomo.pdf


We hope this article helps to keep you injury free!

The Physio Team

So why is Synchronised Swimming more challenging than rugby?

SYNCHRONISED SWIMMING

It looks effortless, they’re smiling, it’s a girl’s sport and their hair even stays in place……. so it must be easy.

Find out what makes a Synchronised Swimmer a highly tuned athlete.

There is very little known about the Olympic Sport that is Synchronised Swimming. There is the misconception that the sport is for “sissies” and is terribly boring. In fact, most of you would probably change the channel when it comes on the TV. This blog aims to quash these mistaken beliefs! There is more to Synchronised Swimming than women in skimpy outfits, super strong hair paste and water-proof make-up.

It is a sport which requires the endurance of distance swimming and track, the strength and power of water polo, the choreography and artistic grace of dance and the figures, leaps and spins of figure-skating performed in an unstable medium: WATER.

Make-up brings out the swimmer's features and the smile seen plastered on a swimmer's face are meant to deceive the audience into believing that the performance is easy. Far from it. There is actually a lot of arduous training, strength and stamina involved that makes a game of Rugby look like a walk in the park.

Soooo….if you would like to know a little bit more about this sport then read on…and we promise we won’t tell any of your friends.

Top 5 interesting facts about Synchronised Swimming.

1. Synchronised performances last four minutes, three of which the swimmers are often underwater. Teams will regularly remain underwater for a full minute during a routine. We remind you that while submersed, they do all sorts of crazy acrobatics we couldn’t do with a trampoline and a bottle of whisky. They train for this by swimming laps underwater without coming up. Most swimmers can hold their breath for around three minutes and swim 75 meters without grabbing some oxygen. The effort can be compared to running without taking a breath for up to 30 seconds. Try that this weekend.
    
2. A synchronised swimming team practices more than any other sport. Between eight and ten hours a day, six days a week.
    
3. The secret to the perfect hair that doesn’t seem to move is horse cartilage. Yep, swimmers buy a package of unflavoured gelatin from the supermarket, dissolve it in water and then brush it on their hair before competition. The key ingredient in the paste, though, is soft equine cartilage (a main component of gelatin) that is apparently quite healthy for the hair. The paste keeps the hair stiff and in place throughout competition. A shower in really hot water is the only way to break loose.
    
4. Try listening to music underwater and you’ll understand the difficulty of underwater sound! The impedance of water is 3,600 times that of air. What little sound is transmitted beneath the water relies more on bone conduction through the middle and inner ear than the traditional route through the eardrum. There’s a 62-decibel offset between sound in the air and that in water. Normal talking is approximately 60 db, meaning communicating at that same relative intensity requires 122 db in the pool. Doesn’t sound that bad till you realize 120 db is somewhere between the noise level created by a jet airliner and that of the threshold for human pain!! But swimmers can’t perform their intricate dance moves in unison if the music is only audible above the water. Synchronised swimmers rely on some pretty impressive underwater speaker technology similar to what is used in military and anti-terrorist organizations.! Whoa.
    
5. Finally…what is the most essential piece of equipment in synchronised swimming? The NOSE CLIP. The nose clip allows swimmers to perform leg movements and elements upside-down without getting water in their nose. A swimmer often carries an extra nose clip in her suit, just in case the one she is wearing gets knocked off during a routine. Thus the nose clip is a very important necessity. Who would have thought?!

To see the Great Britain Synchronised swimming team in action, click here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpsetKOePPk

For competition information on the London 2012 Olympics, check out this link:
http://www.london2012.com/synchronised-swimming/about/

Ever thought about giving Synchronised swimming a go?

Try these 2 basic moves:

1. The Egg-beater Kick (a highly efficient way of treading water)
   
   - Keep your back straight, knees bent so that the thighs are parallel to the surface of the water
     and the lower legs are perpendicular to the surface.
   
   - The left foot makes a clockwise motion while the right leg makes a counterclockwise motion.
   
   - The legs should never meet because when one foot is on the inside of the motion, the other
     should be on the outside. Hey presto! That’s how you stay above the surface of the water in
     synchronised swimming!
    

The Boost (Simply launching as high out of the water headfirst as you can without touching the bottom of the pool!)

- Go right under water.

- Squish your body like a spring ready to…spring!

- Push your hands and do one giant breaststroke kick to propel yourself headfirst out of the water.

Celebrate our 20th Anniversary with us!

Never mind the Olympic opening ceremony we have been open 20 years today! To celebrate our anniversary, we would like to offer you £5 off a treatment with us before the 5th of August, when you book your session saying "Happy Anniversary". Have we helped you recover from an injury? Do let us know what you think of our service and leave a comment below.   The Physio Team T&Cs Apply - Not to be used with any other offer

Dr Bunhead helps explain the ‘God Particle’

So what is all this fuss about? Watch the interview one of our patients gave last week on ITV’s Scotland Tonight. There are a few introduction adverts, but it’s worth the ‘weight’!

http://local.stv.tv/edinburgh/109446-scientists-celebrate-as-breakthrough-achieved-in-search-for-god-particle

Back to Anatomy School...

Last week the Edinburgh and Glasgow teams joined forces and headed back to school for an afternoon in the Anatomy Department at Edinburgh University.

The team of 15 therapists including physios and massage therapists alike, were taken under the wing of Gordon Findlater, head of the Anatomy School. Gordon is an extensive encyclopaedia of knowledge regarding all things bony, fleshy, muscley and nervy, and gave us a top to toe revision of our anatomy.

The session, lasting around 3 hours, was a fantastic reminder of the structure of the body- the depth and thickness of each muscle, the distribution of the nerves and the relationships between the body’s systems. Seeing anatomy in 3D is the most effective way to learn and remember.

A big thank you to, Gordon Findlater, our Anatomy instructor at the University, for guiding us through the maze we call the human body!

All in a days work….

The Physio Centre has had a busy start to the week with Kirsten, Vicky and Thirza spending Tuesday afternoon at the Parliament as part of Workout at Work Day organised by the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy.




The day was all about advising the MSPs and their staff on being more active throughout the day.



We also assessed their workstations and gave advice on posture.



If you suffer from back, neck or shoulder pain related to work, or you’re worried that you might develop problems in the future, come in for your free drop session. The Physiotherapist will do a quick assessment and give you some advice on ways to improve you symptoms to keep you healthy at work.

Call 0131 556 1116 or email enquiries@edphysio.com to arrange your session. Or for further information see our website www.edphysio.com


The Physio Team.