Professor Lederman's Harmonic's Technique

Yet again Manus Sinstra has come up good with the talk by Prof Lederman. I attended his presentation of his Harmonic Approach to treatment.

Without sounding two sceptical (i.e. that the Manus Sinstra lectures are just trying to sell us their courses) I was actually impressed with what Professor Lederman had to say. Unfortunately I won’t be able to explain what he had to say so eloquently, but basically harmonic techniques work on 3 organisational levels:

1. The local tissue organisation
The reparative processes following tissue damage
The physical and mechanical properties of the tissues
Fluid dynamics (blood, lymph and extracellular and synovial fluids)

2. The neurological organisation
Increasing proprioceptive stimulation
The gating of pain

3. The psychophysiological organisation
A generalised reduction in motor tone
Generalised autonomic changes
The modification of pain perception and tolerance
Body-self and body-image integration
A relaxation response

(You can tell I was that impressed that I bought the books hehe)


So have I used Professor Lederman's Harmonic Technique in clinic ... the simple answer is yes .... but the true is I’m not sure as to how effectively I have utilised it. In the true sense of reflection of my actions I think that I have used it as more of a stop-gap between techniques ore when I’m feeling stuck or waiting for the tutor to arrive after examination as opposed to a first line treatment.

One think that stuck in my mind was the Professor Lederman said that he would spend all of his time with his patients treating them with harmonics, i.e. that he would literally oscillate the patient for hundreds and hundreds of times in a session. I think that I would have trouble trying to justify to any of the clinic tutors why I had spend the whole of a treatment session waggling a patients limb in the air as I haven’t spend enough time reading the texts. Hence in reality I question how effective my attempts at Harmonics have been as I just have not repeated the motion enough times to have a therapeutic effect.

I have used harmonics on a few patients with success however !!! One example has been whilst treating a 64 year old lady with degenerative changes of her spine. Part of the treatment was using Harmonics on her Lumbar Spine to show her that her spine is able to move and move in a pain free range, hence to try to reinforce to her that staying active and mobile is good for her back and that she can actually do it. The other types of patients that I have used it for is for patients with Adhesive Capsulitis. I have found it an excellent way of increasing the range of movement within the pain free barrier and to increase the range of motion slowing but surely whilst the treatment remains pain free or at least a low level of pain as the restrictive barrier is reached whilst the angle/degree of oscillation is increased. It is also a good way and well documented way of patients self-treating Adhesive Capsulitis in between treatments.

Me demonstrating the self-treatment of the GH joint with Harmonics (I really need to smile hehe)