Neuro Kinetic Therapy
So Physio is your holistic physiotherapy clinic in Albany, North Shore and Auckland City Central. We are ACC providers and do not require any referrals prior to an appointment. We utilize multiple whole body approach in our treatment plans and one of them includes Neuro Kinetic Therapy.
What is Neuro Kinetic Therapy?
Neuro Kinetic Therapy (NKT) is a corrective movement system assessment and treatment modality that can treat and identify the root cause of dysfunctional movements. Our ability to coordinate our movement patterns occur in the motor control center found in the cerebellum. With NKT, we can teach and correct movement at their root.
What do we mean by dysfunctional movements?
First, lets talk about movements. We move as a whole – the body moves as one due to the interconnection of muscle, fascia, nerves etc. When we move, we talk about them as a movement pattern. For example, sitting up from a chair is a movement pattern, throwing a ball is a movement pattern etc etc. As a baby, we learn to move by through the development stages. At month 4-5, babies start to roll, at about the 7th month they start to crawl. If you look at a baby properly, when they are learning those basic movement patterns, they practice and practice until they succeed. They undergo motor learning and develop the proper movement pattern through learning. The cerebellum then receives enough information to keep that in the brain’s hard drive – so that those movements become automatic and second nature to us.
When we start to adapt dysfunctional movements, compensatory patterns are happening. It can be something as simple as muscles tighten and never loosening up to give us false stability. Many compensatory mechanisms we see are holding breathe when lifting weights, clenching jaw when you are stressed, eyes looking towards one direction to concentrate while you are moving etc etc.
What has that got to do with my injury?
When an injury occurs, certain muscle shuts down or becomes ‘weak’, causing other muscles to overcompensate or to help, and that causes our pain or symptoms. The longer the injury has happened, the more compensation the body would go through and more muscles would start to shut down, which is why chronic presentations are harder to treat and take a lot longer to treat.
What if my pain came on suddenly with no indication of an injury or accident?
When that happens, it is the results of ongoing dysfunctional and compensatory mechanism. We can develop dysfunctional movements from something simple like poor posture or poor movement habits. The body is lazy. It will always find the easiest way to do something. Hence, we start to compensate. With poor movements and posture we develop inhibition or ‘weakness’ of our stabilisers, and more overcompensation occurs to help us carry out our daily lives. The body is amazing. It helps you to hold on as much as it can, for as long as it can, but like everything, it’s not a long-term solution. I call it a ticking time bomb. It’s like the guy in the office that is always pulling everyone else’s weight, or the team member in a group project picking up after that slacker that puts in zero effort. Sooner or later, they are going to snap and throw in that towel. They have had enough. Same thing, the body will decide that it is unable to carry the weight anymore and just shut down. This is when pain come in, to bring the awareness to the brain to get treatment.
Neuro Kinetic Therapy is the essence of what we do here at So Physio. It allows us to treat the root problem, not just the symptoms. It gives you that high level of care you and your body deserve. With NKT we can treat:
· Lower back pain
· Neck pain
· Scars
· Eye movements
· Jaw (TMJ) dysfunctions or pain
· Tight muscles
· Chronic or unresolved pain
· Carpal Tunnel, deQuervain’s syndrome
· Tennis or Golfer’s elbow
· Joint issues
· Running injuries
· And more…..
Want to feel the change? Tried everything and nothing has worked? Book in and get assessed! Nicole is the only advanced (Level 3) NKT practitioner in North Shore, Auckland. Find out more information here.