The NeuFit Undercurrent Podcast

In this episode, I'm joined by Lisa Chase, PT. She's the Co-Chair of the Functional Manual Medicine Certification Program at Michigan State University, former Medical Director of the WTA Tour (professional women's tennis), and owner of Back 2 Normal Physical Therapy in St. Petersburg, FL. She describes how she's spent her career looking for "game changers" in the physical therapy profession. The first she found was the Michigan State treatment model, including the manual therapy techniques in the curriculum that she now teaches. She discusses some of these concepts and techniques, including muscle energy, biomechanics, and manual therapy. Her most recent "game changer" has been the NEUBIE, and she shares how she's been able to use the NEUBIE to amplify the benefits of her manual therapy plus exercise treatment model, and also help people who would have been more difficult to treat manually because of their neurological guarding. With some of her stories from professional tennis and other clinical pearls, this episode is jam-packed!

Following up on our "re-introduction" to the nervous system from two episodes ago, we are going to take a deeper dive into the topic of pain. While most people think pain is an input ("that hurt me"), pain is really an output signal from our brains. The brain triggers pain in response to perceived threat, and that threat can be real or imagined, physical or non-physical. We review some real-world applications of these principles and how it can lead us to more effective treatment strategies.  “Sports Medicine Said to Overuse MRI’s” https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/29/health/mris-often-overused-often-mislead-doctors-warn.html Article on Back Pain and Imaging:  https://www.bmj.com/content/bmj/372/bmj.n291.full.pdf

In this episode, I'm joined by recently retired IFBB Pro Bodybuilder, Mike Giliotti. Mike is a master trainer with expertise in corrective exercise working as part of a multi-disciplinary team in Staten Island, NY to help people with all aspects of their health and physique. He shares his experiences using the Neubie with himself and various clients, including his own introduction to the Neubie that included a near-miraculous reversal of his chronic knee pain. It allowed him to continue training while keeping his knee pain at bay, and led to 4+ inch growth(!) in his legs. He also shares his wonderful perspective on mind-muscle connection, being mentally present and aware during exercise, some stories of client transformations and successes, and some of the particulars of how he's implementing the Neubie.

In this solo episode, I attempt to make the nervous system less intimidating by sharing some concepts and models that can help us all understand the nervous system. One of those concepts is the "black box," a theoretical object that accepts inputs, processes them, and creates outputs. We can view the nervous system as a big feedback loop that operates in this manner, and I share several examples of how the loop works to bring it to life. Another concept that helps us understand how the nervous system works is to understand that the brain's #1 priority is survival and protection. Because of that priority, the brain would rather have us do less and not more in order to keep us safe, and our brains often impose limitations on our bodies. Finally, we'll discuss how the purpose of functional neurology is to impact this loop by providing the right inputs, and what that can mean for rehabilitation and performance. Focusing on the software of the body, the nervous system, opens up breakthroughs in healing. This episode will help you better understand how to make those breakthroughs in your own lives and the lives of your patients/clients.

In this episode, Dr. John Marchese D.C. talks with us about Functional Neurology. We discuss how to precisely identify overactive or underactive brain areas and to guide them to optimal levels, what impact that can have on patient outcomes (even in "orthopedic" cases), how he uses the Neubie through the lens of functional neurology, his thoughts on asymmetrical training, and some common strength and conditioning tools that can actually create some problems when you look at them from a neurological perspective (including a bit about foam rolling, assault bikes, and more). 

For this, our 50th episode of the NeuFit Undercurrent Podcast, I'm proud to welcome our biggest guest yet. Not just big physically, standing 6 foot 10 inches tall, but also big in the world of tennis. John Isner is the highest-ranked American tennis player in the world, has won dozens of professional tournaments, and holds the record for the longest tennis match of all time at over eleven hours long.   It takes a special kind of resilience and determination to perform at that high of a level every season -- and to continue doing it at age 36. Listen in as John describes how prioritizing his fitness and enhancing his recovery with the Neubie has enabled him to perform at the top level of his sport at an age where many of his competitors are declining or considering retirement.

(Note: this episode was extracted from a presentation Dr. Buckner gave during a recent Mastermind call among NeuFit practitioners. For a more complete experience, please check out this episode on YouTube which includes a slide presentation) In this episode of the NeuFit Undercurrent podcast, Dr. Sam Buckner Ph.D. joins our monthly Mastermind call to go over the results of his study "The acute muscular response following a novel form of pulsed direct current stimulation (Neubie) or traditional resistance exercise." In the study, he shows that the acute response to training with the Neubie and no external load is similar to traditional resistance training with 70% of maximum resistance. The measured responses include increased muscle thickness (as measured by ultrasound), and also fatigue and soreness. While the Neubie is already FDA-cleared for reducing atrophy, this is the first research study directly demonstrating that it may be able to do more in the realm of hyptertrophy, or muscle growth. By showing an acute, short-term response, it also leads to more questions about long-term effects which Dr. Buckner brings up and that will be answered in his future studies. Questions like: can the Neubie grow muscle over a complete training cycle? And how does it compare to traditional weight training? Listen in to hear the details of the study as well as the science behind low-load training and why it can be beneficial in many circumstances. A link to the published article is below: https://www.ismni.org/jmni/accepted/JMNI_21M-08-159.pdf

Diagnosed with cerebral palsy (CP) at the age of 2, James Norris had a tough time participating in the sports he loved and wanted to play. At different times throughout his life, that also made it tough for him to fit in and have a positive sense of self.    As an adult, he became dissatisfied with his physical condition and discovered fitness. As he saw the improvements in himself and got more passionate about the work, he decided to start Handi-Capable Fitness to support other people who were working to overcome various disabilities in order to play a sport or build a regular fitness practice. He now runs this 501c(3) non-profit and provides grants to others who are on the same path.   We had the wonderful pleasure of meeting James when he was speaking at the SXSW Conference in Austin, TX. In addition to sharing his story, in this episode James talks about the immediate impact the Neubie had on him by helping him get more wrist movement than he's had in years as well as increased activation of the muscles he knows he needs to activate for standing but isn't able to consciously recruit on his own. To learn more about his work, check out https://www.handicapablefitness.com/ and enjoy this inspiring conversation with James!

In this episode, Matt Cooper shares his unique and very holistic perspective on athletic performance, which includes an excellent discussion on biomechanics and fascial slings, the concept of "movement literacy," training proprioception, and how to structure sessions and prioritize different traits and qualities of an athlete.  To see one of Matt's articles that we mentioned on the show, check out: https://simplifaster.com/articles/proprioception-training-sports-performance/ Visit our WEBSITE www.neu.fit to learn more! Follow us on INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/neufitrfp/ Join our FACEBOOK page: https://www.facebook.com/neufitRFP 

I am so excited to talk with Dr. Terry Wahls, author of the book The Wahls Protocol, and an incredible researcher looking at how lifestyle changes can help multiple sclerosis (MS) patients control their symptoms and stop the functional decline that so often comes with MS. In this episode, Dr. Wahls talks about how her own diagnosis of MS took her from being super active to a full reclining wheelchair. Not satisfied with the existing methods of treatment, Dr. Wahls dove deep into creating a diet focused on autoimmune health. Listen in as Dr. Wahls describes her milestones on the way to a full recovery plus what she's doing to manage her recovery now -- including her use of electrical stimulation throughout her healing journey and how it's evolved over the last two decades. Additional Note: For any patients who are interested in signing up for the study that Dr. Wahls mentioned on this podcast, please visit https://wahls.lab.uiowa.edu/join-study   Visit our WEBSITE www.neu.fit to learn more! Follow us on INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/neufitrfp/ Join our FACEBOOK page: https://www.facebook.com/neufitRFP