The Thinking Practitioner Podcast

40. How to (Not) Fix It (with Cal Cates): Til and Whitney talk to Healwell’s Cal Cates about how their work with death and dying brought perspective and presence to their work as a massage therapist; and to living itself.

39: How often do we think about the assumptions that inform our decisions? Til Luchau talks to writer Ruth Werner about her recent work on critical thinking skills, steps, and stages.

38: Whitney Lowe & Til Luchau give a crash course on frozen shoulder/adhesive capsulitis, discussing recent research findings and comparing their respective views and strategies. Download the free handout with detailed episode notes, techniques and tests, and join them at the upcoming Shoulder Jam event via Whitney or Til’s sign-up link.

37: Til Luchau and Whitney Lowe share their ideas, strategies, techniques, and tests for better results with the most common type of shoulder condition, subacromial pain syndrome (SAPS) and its myriad presentations, including rotator cuff pain, etc. Download the handout with detailed episode notes, techniques and tests from http://a-t.tv/ttp-saps/

36: Whitney Lowe talks with Robin Anderson about her new role as president of the Massage Therapy Foundation and how research plays an important role in our field. They also dive deep into some issues around curriculum design and the crucial importance of developing solid educational programs to ensure the future success of our field.  

35: Til Luchau and Whitney Lowe share their top resources for information and inspiration, both professionally and personally, letting us in on everything from their favorite podcasts, playlists, books, and apps, to how they recharge and find meaning in their work and in their lives.

34: Whitney Lowe and Til Luchau share trivia, tips, tests, and techniques for working with thoracic outlet syndrome (TOS), including some cool self-care methods for you and your clients. Find out why TOS is “one of the most controversial topics in musculoskeletal medicine,” and how Til and Whitney actually work with TOS symptoms in practice.

33: Dealing With Adversity (with Drew Freedman) Clinician and educator Drew Freedman talks about navigating many challenges of managing a busy clinic in the heart of Boston. The clinic was severely impacted by the Boston Marathon bombing and then again this past year during the Covid challenge. We discuss how to face adversity and how to continue looking forward and not let these challenges drag you down.

32: Bodywork pioneer Art Riggs was one of the first Certified Rolfers to publish a book about “advanced” techniques. His textbook (Deep Tissue Massage) was adopted by massage therapy programs worldwide, and as a result, his teaching and style has influenced tens of thousands massage and manual therapists in the decades since. Art talks with Til Luchau about his work, aging, self-care, and more.

31: What are cervicogenic headaches? Are they even a thing, and if so, why are they particularly amenable to manual therapy and massage? Til Luchau and Whitney Lowe discuss these questions, and share some self-care tips for you and your clients. Download the handout with detailed episode notes, techniques and tests from http://a-t.tv/ttp-cgh/

Episode topics include:
– What kinds of headaches CAN manual therapy help with?
– What’s the controversy around cervicogenic headaches?
– What kinds of self-care help?

30: What makes taking care of ourselves so hard? Til Luchau and Whitney Lowe dissect the difficulties, and share their favorite excuses for not putting their own care first.

Episode topics include:
– The five key self-care behaviors;
– The date we’re most likely to give up on our resolutions;
– Getting “internal bipartisanship” around your own self-care initiatives.

29: Til Luchau and Whitney Lowe review highlights and take-aways from the star-studded first season of their acclaimed podcast (yea, right).

Episode topics include:
– Most-Downloaded
– First Season, by Episode

28: Whitney Lowe talks with Cal Cates, executive director of Healwell. They tackle the challenging issues of how to recognize advanced training and the challenges of integrating massage into the healthcare system.

Episode topics include:
– Why is advanced credentialing important for us?
– What are some of the big challenges we face when attempting to be part of the healthcare system?
– Who is ultimately responsible for advanced credentialing?

27: Til Luchau and Whitney Lowe discuss the most famous (yet, unreplicated) illustration in neuroscience, the sensorimotor homunculus, which purports to show the proportion of the brain dedicated to each body part. Is it accurate?

Episode topics include:
– Is the cortical homunculus a map, or the territory?
– How did it come about? Penfield’s methods and limitations.
– How might this all apply to manual therapy and massage?

26: Til Luchau talks with Polish physical therapist, Anatomy Trains teacher, and manual therapist Wojtek Cackowski about his innovative Zoga Movement method, and how it can help manual therapists not only with their clients, but with their own embodiment and self care.

Episode topics include:
– Fascial shearing and gliding, vs fascial “stretching”
– What is Zoga? How does it relate to manual therapy and massage?
– Til and Wojtek’s collaborative online courses combining Zoga and Advanced Myofascial Techniques

25: Whitney and Til discuss the controversies, disagreements, considerations, and their own views on the infamous psoas muscle in manual therapy and massage. Download the handout with detailed episode notes, techniques and tests, and a special chapter from Til’s book from http://a-t.tv/ttp-psoas/

Episode topics include:
– Psoas: Holy Grail muscle, or wholly irrelevant?
– Psoas and back pain, leg length, etc.;
– Safety considerations;
– What Til and Whitney actually do in practice.

24: Whitney and Til share a treasure chest of foot-pain ideas and techniques, packed full of assessments, anatomy, concepts, and hands-on tools. Download the free (optional) handout and follow along as Til and Whitney give an audio preview of their upcoming Plantar Foot Pain collaborative webinar (part of the ABMP CE Summit).

23. Mark Bishop’s research shows that clients who think treatment will help benefit more than those who don’t expect much relief. What is more, practitioners who expect their modality will help actually get better results than practitioners who are less certain. What’s up with that?

In this episode, Til and Whitney interview manual therapist, physiotherapist and researcher Mark Bishop about his fascinating investigations into how expectations can shape results; the role of client preferences in treatment success; and how practitioners can most effectively leverage these effects.

22. Anatomist Gil Hedley discusses fascial debacles, debates, and dissection with Til Luchau.

In this episode,
– Gil Hedley’s Fuzz Speech: facts, fantasies, and furor
– Sexuality in the dissection room.
– Conspiracies: pattern of meaning, or menace?

21: Whitney and Til discuss a very common (but poorly researched) complaint: upper thoracic spine pain, and what to do about it.

In this episode,
– Does posture drive upper back pain? Does psychology?
– Breaking the Upper-Cross-Syndrome rules (and what “PhD” doesn’t really stand for).
– The Over-the-Edge technique for upper back pain.

20: Whitney and Til discuss assessment and treatment considerations unique to working with the neck and cervical region; how their respective training programs are adapting to the challenges of COVID-19; and much more.

In this episode,
– Neck issues: shifting from tissue fault to nociceptive driver
– Can we treat the neck in isolation?
– Thoughts on “text neck,” and more.

19: How do we manage risk, in a world where we don’t even agree about what the risks are? Pathology writer Ruth Werner joins Til and Whitney for a lively conversation about risk, risk tolerance, and ethical decision making in massage and manual therapy, in the face of both COVID-19, and in the differences in how we perceive the risks involved.

18: Project COPE is tracking the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on both essential and “non-essential” healthcare practitioners, including massage therapists and bodyworkers. It’s already revealing some insights about representation and diversity in our field. Listen to learn more, and participate in the project.

17: Manual therapy and massage practitioners are voracious consumers of professional continuing education. Who should be deciding what they learn?

In this episode,
– What implications does the “medically necessary” discussion have on massage and bodywork education, CE, and credentialing?
– Why don’t Rolfers™ think they’re doing massage, anway?
– What is the post-COVID roadmap for professional continuing education?

16: Benny Vaughn, an iconic figure in massage therapy, talks with Whitney Lowe and Til Luchau about his experiences as a African American massage therapist, and offers both practical advice and deep inspiration on how manual therapists can address racism and bias in their own lives.

15: Fascia evokes widely divergent responses from manual therapists, with viewpoints ranging from “incredible” to “irrelevant.” Til Luchau talks with fascial researcher Robert Schleip PhD about his current perspectives on tissue change and the nervous system in manual therapy; fascial debates; and much more.

In this episode,
– Questioning the tissue-based narratives in manual therapy
– Putting to rest the question “How is your work misunderstood?”
– Inflammation, insula, networking, and much more.

14: A lot of hands-on therapists are wondering about “staying with it.”  Til and Whitney explore the reasons massage and manual therapy practitioners might (and might not) be thinking about quitting.

13: Inflammation is implicated in nearly all musculoskeletal complaints, including chronic pain. Til and Whitney explain this, and talk about the implications for massage and manual therapy.

In this episode,
– Are most client complaints related to inflammation? 
– What most practitioners don’t understand about inflammation,
– Key points practitioners should keep in mind,

12: Coronavirus symptoms range from mild to fatal. Though still mysterious, in many patients it seems to be the patient’s own inflammatory reactions that tip the scale. Til and Whitney explain this, and talk about the implications for massage and manual therapy.  

In this episode,
– What is the deal about COVID-19 and cytokine storms? 
– What is a cytokine, and why do I care? 
– As massage therapists and bodyworkers, where does this leave us? 

11: Does manual therapy stretch the tissues? Til and Whitney consider the history, evidence, debates and implications of this fascinating question.

In this episode,
– Myths and misperceptions about stretching,
– Are we stretching connective tissue, or nervous system?
– What does this mean for massage, bodywork, and manual therapy?

10: Whitney and Til consider the debates about tissue-based effects in manual therapy, and share their views about when it makes sense to think about the actual tissues and physical effects of hands-on works.

In this episode,
– Why would people say that the tissue doesn’t matter in manual therapy?
– Examples of tissue-based narratives; the arguments for, and against
– Til and Whitney ask each other, “What tissue effects do you think about when you’re working?”

09: Whitney and Til discuss the descending modulation of pain in manual therapy. 

In this episode,
– What is descending modulation?
– What are the implications?
– How do we use it?

08: Til and Whitney talk about the key challenges and opportunities facing manual therapy, bodywork, and massage therapy. (Part 2 of 2)

In this episode,
– Increasing the accuracy of our explanations,
– Polarization, divisiveness, and infighting within the profession,
– Consolidation and up-scaling of the bodywork “industry,” and more.

07: Til and Whitney talk about hands-on work with scoliosis.

In this episode,
– What do we know about scoliosis’ causes?
– What are some common scoliosis myths?
– When is scoliosis a problem?
– What are conventional treatments?
– What’s manual therapy’s role? And much more.

06: Til and Whitney discuss considerations for hands-on work with tendinopathies and tendon issues.

In this episode,
– What is a tendinopathy? Examples?
– Tendinitis vs.tendinosis; tenosynovitis
– What are typical signs?
– What is known about causes?
– Inflammation or degeneration?
– Collagen, paretenon, fascicles, etc,
– Nerval arborization/sprouting,
– What’s manual therapy’s role?
– Approaches, debates, consensus, and much more…

05: Whitney talks with Diana Thompson about documentation, health records, and including massage therapy in mainstream healthcare practices.

In this episode,
Introducing Diana Thompson 
– History of Hands Heal and SOAP documentation for massage therapy 
– Washington’s “every category of provider” clause
– Electronic health records and the future of clinical documentation
– and more.

04: Til and Whitney talk about the key challenges and opportunities facing manual therapy, bodywork, and massage therapy. (Part 1 of 2)

In this episode,
– Aging practitioners, younger students
– Split personality of the profession
– The epidemic of over-busyness
– Income issues
– and more

03: Til and Whitney discuss sacroiliac joint pain and hand-on therapies: causes, controversies, and considerations.

In this episode,
– What causes SIJ pain? 
– Does the SIJ move a little, or a lot? 
– What about hypermobility? 
– What are the controversies? 
– What does the research say? 
– Key considerations for manual therapists, 
– and much more.

02: In this episode, Til and Whitney interview each other about their backgrounds, histories, and current interests. (Part 2 of 2)

In this episode, Til and Whitney interview each other about their backgrounds, histories, and current interests. Part 1 of 2.

Join two of the leading educators in manual therapy, bodywork, and massage therapy, as they delve into the most intriguing issues, questions, research, and client conditions that hands-on practitioners face. Stimulate your thinking with imaginative conversations, tips, and interviews related to the somatic arts and sciences. With Whitney Lowe and Til Luchau.