Z-Health and the Firehouse

Today I gave z-health a trial run at my station. One of my crew members was kind enough to let me use him to practice the techniques I learned this weekend at the essentials course. He was also kind enough to let me write about the results of the drills and corrections here.

His main complaint was shoulder tightness and limited range of motion. He wrestled, did track and field throwing events and sprinting, and played football in high school. He's also had surgery to his right shoulder using a screw to repair a complete separation.

After assessing his arm abduction (raising his arm from by his side laterally to overhead), raising in front to overhead, and toe touches, we started in on the basic joint mobilization exercises from feet all the way up to the head. The exercises that seemed to help his shoulder the most were lateral ankle tilts and medial and lateral toe pulls. He mentioned he had a history of multiple ankle sprains. These exercises made his nervous system feel more comfortable with these movements, and thus relax its grip on the body as a whole. This resulted in increased shoulder mobility. Afterwards, thinking of the examples in class where Doctor Cobb mobilized one woman's shoulder through working on her wrist, I asked my co-worker about any injuries down stream to the shoulders; to elbows, wrists, fingers, etc. He mentioned he had jammed and dislocated his fingers multiple times during wrestling and football. We performed a few finger waves and again noticed a significant increase in the range of motion in his shoulders.

As we moved into the balance portion of the drills, he mentioned that he thought his balance might be a bit off, because he noticed recently he had been becoming more nauseated when going on amusement park rides. The nausea made me think more of eye tracking and vision over balance. He then stated he had noticed his vision taking a little bit longer at night to focus between objects at different distances. He is also an avid hunter and spends a lot of time sighting through his right eye. We went through the vision drills and had the most success with pencil push-up drill with a correction to engage his left eye, and the near/far focusing drill.

All in all, he gained about 20-30 degrees of range of motion in his shoulders in both the lateral and frontal raises, and also noticed improvements to his vision. We accomplished this in around an hours worth of work.

I've continued with my drills, a few of the drills Dr. Cobb showed me, specifically for ankle mobility, and sets of 10 jackknife squats. Today my left ankle dorsiflexion is almost as good as my right ankle. I was able to lower into and stay in the low position of the jackknife squat unsupported, for the first time in probably a good 2 years. The motion through the joint feels much smoother, and my overall coordination has improved. Little things like getting into and out of the rig feel much smoother and easier. I've also noticed an increased sense of calmness at work. This is most likely due in large part to the vision work. When my eyes work together and focus, looking around at my environment is enjoyable, rather than a strain. Speaking of which, I have to go now and do some pencil push-ups to make up for the time spent on the computer tonight.