This week I drop in with Joe Muscolino who is a well known and well traveled continuing education instructor. The conversation we recorded had so much content that I decided to break it into two episodes so that it wasn’t too overwhelming. I find it useful to have information broken down into chunks. If you are an individual that does not like to have to wait to hear or see the conclusion of something, then I recommend you wait until the second episode is released to listen to the first.
Joe is a Doctor of Chiropractic who has been in private practice since 1985, he has taught anatomy and physiology at the university level for 5 years, and he taught at a massage school for 24 years, and he does workshops all over the world. He writes a regular feature article in massage and bodywork magazine, and he has written many other articles for other magazines and trade journals across the field. He also has an extensive online video library and resource center catered to manual therapists which you can find here: https://learnmuscles.com/?ref=34
In this episode:
[03:35] Joe’s journey into chiropractic care
[07:06] Importance of critical thinking
[14:01] Example using Sciatica
[20:56] Example using a muscle
[29:21] Anatomy isn’t everything
[31:40] If he could only use one form of therapy it would be…
[34:34] Grades of joint mobilization
[37:59] Proprietary techniques
[40:19] Brand new patient today
[46:26] The unusual suspects
Quotes from this episode:
“To me, muscles seem to be more important than bones.”
“Bones are passive elements, muscles are active contractile tissue.”
“The world of massage… is still a little bit of the wild west with regards to terms, and terms being defined.”
“People rarely present in the exact way the textbook say they will present.”
“People rarely come in when they have their first sign or symptom.”
“If you can close your eyes and see anatomy, you’re golden.”
“There are two things that make a great therapist. The first is a good mind, the second is good hands.”
“40 of the 50 states legally and ethically allow joint mobilization to be done by massage therapists.”
“Joint mobilization is really just a specific form of pin and stretch.”
“If you take all of the therapies available to me under my scope of my license… If you told me I could only have one therapy. I would take soft tissue manipulation and massage.”
“Palpation is subjective.”
“I think palpation is the gold standard for assessments.”
“When we are going in to palpate, we have to go in with clear intent… which means we don’t have the answer before we have gathered the information.”