Biomechanics and REAL function

I have been an Osteopath since 1999 and part and parcel of being an osteopath is having a thorough understanding of anatomy, biomechanics as well as medicine and pathology.

This year I had the privilege of doing a mentorship with the Gray Institute called GIFT. This was a 40 week course working with the world legends Gary Gray and Dave Tiberio. They created ‘Applied Functional Science’ or AFS. This is the real science behind movement and not what is says in the anatomy books! Gary Gray has been a US physical therapist for more than 35 years and has been working with Dave Tiberio since then. They look at REAL function and how everything changes when your foot hits the floor.

Assessment and rehabilitation is all done in 3 planes and mostly standing, using the full impact of gravity and ground reaction! This uses correct neurological pathways as your proprioception is ‘switched on’ and so you are able to assess what the body is able to ‘functionally’ achieve. This is very different from feeling and seeing what a back, hip or knee does while lying on a table.

Very few people REALLY look at the body in the way they (or I do now) do. Some will look at the tri-plane movement of the foot and sub-talar joint, but they don’t link this to the hip or scapular or cervical spine in gait, hitting a golf ball or bowling. Gary Gray and Dave Tiberio teach all this to the extent of how your psoas affects your scapular or foot! Quite brilliant!

GIFT has been inspirational and an amazing journey and it has set me alight! It has given me more passion to further the osteopathic and functional model. GIFT is a huge investment both financially and in your time. But I looked at it as just that…. an investment. An investment in me and an investment in my patients. So worth it!

If anyone is interested in doing something like this, look at their website and if you cannot manage something so big as GIFT, look at one of their Chain Reaction courses or their online content.