Here are a few pics of my latest rehab tool. A friend of mine, Ben Town, an ATC who teaches out at Southern Maine University, recommended I start working on the extensors of my hand and wrist so that when I can get into more direct elbow rehab it will be speedier. So a ten gallon bucket and a whole lot of rice and I have a new rehab tool.
It actually makes great sense. If you look back at my post about osteoarthritis, you can see how a muscle imbalance may contribute to osteoarthritis. I spend most of my time doing flexion with my hands, wrist, elbow. My work consists of a lot of hands on manual therapy (Active Release Technique), my hobbies are lifting, bouldering (high intensity finger/hand/wrist flexion) mountain biking (high isometric flexion). My flexors get extreme work/abuse. My extensor do not get much work at all. Hello, muscle imbalance.
So with muscle imbalance leads to muscle tightness leads to alternate Range of Motion (ROM). What you do is plunge your hands into the rice, and open up your hands as wide as possible. It's pretty easy at first, but after about 30 seconds you really start to feel those muscles start to tire out. This will at least start to bring back a little bit more balance between your flexors/extensors of the hand.
Try doing the same thing with one of those blue broccoli rubber bands. Keep it in your car and do repetitions when your stopped at a red light. Same basic idea with a lot less mess or expense.
ReplyDeletecool....tried it out...works pretty good!
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