Water Therapy and Rehab:

I recently came across a form of water therapy called the Burdenko method. The article talks about how this method and its creator, Russian immigrant Igor Burdenko used a form of water therapy to rehab figure skater Nancy Kerrigan prior to her winning the Silver medal in the '94 Olympics.

You may remember that Kerrigan was assaulted five weeks prior to the Olympics. She credits Burdenko and the water therapy for allowing her to recover quickly. Burdenko uses a combination of water and land therapy for great results.

The Burdenko method has been used with professional athletes, as well as those with severe injuries. When I worked in physical therapy, they had a heated therapy pool that was used with good results, for a variety of injuries.

Many times you think of water exercise for the elderly, but the therapy pool was used by people of all ages, including junior high and high school athletes. It seemed to help speed up the healing process. More than once, I was supervising the exercises of high school football players who were preparing to play each other on Friday night.

In a 12 x 15 foot pool, everyone is pretty close to each other. So while the guys would often exercise in silence, it did seem to help get them healthy, quicker than just traditional land exercise.

In any case, the Burdenko method sounds interesting and I ordered the book to study it further. I may even travel up to Michigan to observe it and get some hands-on info.

I will keep you posted, but water therapy may be something to consider to help increase your mobility and reduce pain, if that is what you need. Maybe water therapy combined with whole body vibration would get better results than either one on their own.

I am starting up my studio soon and will be using whole body vibration along with joint mobility and strength training. Stay tuned.