He can get through his day without suffering. This gets him more bang for his buck, because we’re helping light up the parts of the brain that can feel his foot and it’s going to help decrease the pain signal going to that area so that he feels like it’s safer to move. This is not surprising but this is good information, because it means that part of what will get him better is anything that will help drive sensory stimulus, meaning we put different kinds of pressure and contact against the skin while he’s doing his exercises. I want to see what he can feel as I make contact with these two points around his Achilles and his foot. Fold a paperclip, then touch your skin with both ends. Two-point discrimination means you take two points of contact, fine points in this case-you can use a paperclip to do it. We don’t have any feedback from this area.” So, one of the things I checked with him is called a two-point discrimination test. In absence of appropriate information coming from your tissues, your brain will start to send more pain signals to you, because it’s saying, “Something’s wrong here. Part of what can drive pain is insufficient information going to the brain. Without the ability to get your knee forward, the Achilles and tension of the lower limb are singularly shortened and tight all of the time. No wonder his Achilles hurt! He’s a big guy-probably 6’4”, more than 250 pounds-and he’s carrying a Steadicam, so anytime he needs to step, he’s putting a lot of strain into that Achilles. One of the things I check is ankle dorsiflexion-how far forward can your knee go over your toes? Ideally, you can get your knees at least over your toes with your foot staying flat on the ground. I asked myself, “Why isn’t it getting better? What are some of the likely causes that go into developing Achilles tendonitis?” When he first came in for an assessment I checked pretty much everything head to toe, which I do for any given person, partially just to set a baseline so that I know where any missing links are, even if I think they were not that relevant to the issue in front of me. What is the real source of the issue? Not just, “How can I quell symptoms?” So from my perspective, is very much treating symptoms. A lot of what I’m trying to do with people is get to the deepest cause. So I asked, “What did they do for you?” He said, “Well they gave me a heel lift.” This means they put a little insert in his shoe to elevate his heel, the goal being that the tissue affected by Achilles Tendonitis doesn’t stretch as much. He’s a Steadicam operator, and he had gone to his doctor previously to seek treatment. Liz Cash: A client came to me with Achilles tendonitis pain. She dives into each of these factors in great detail, provides evaluative tests you can try yourself at home, as well as tips for getting through the long weeks of production.įilmmaker: Can you provide an example of an injury you’ve treated for a client to help introduce and visualize your process? As a particularly bodily unaware ex-camera person, I learned much from our conversation that I will carry into my day-to-day.įirst, she offered me her top three things to consider when trying to reduce bodily pain: finding the right footwear, resolving breathing patterns (make sure they’re non-compensatory) and resolving your body’s asymmetries. Prior to pursuing a doctorate in physical therapy, Cash was a camera assistant for over ten years. She is a rare authority on bodily injuries caused or exacerbated by set work. Having absorbed contradictory advice, I was relieved to discover the work of Liz Cash, a NYC-based movement specialist, or strength and conditioning coach, who specializes in the needs of film crew. There are no clear, standardized metrics for what tools and methods work for what bodies individual experiments tends to isolate and dissolve, never fossilizing into a collectively useful reference point. In this environment, a Steadicam operator might recommend a vest for no reason other than it worked for them personally. This was true of both the four camera people I talked with for the article and many of the set workers I’ve encountered in production. When even film workers’ unions provide few resources to prevent bodily harm, crew members create their own devices, so methods of self-preservation tend to vary greatly. In “The Body is a Tool,” I talked with DPs and camera operators about the routines they developed to maintain their bodies against taxingly long days on set. In Cinematography, Filmmaking, Interviews
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |