Seminar Information

This seminar aims to teach you the basics of functional neurology in a simple and easy-to-understand way. It will provide you with fundamental knowledge of nervous system structure and function, as well as teaching examination techniques related to the cerebellum, cranial nerves and eye movements. You will also learn the basic principles of neuro-rehabilitation.

Course Content: 

• How and why neurological dysfunction can occur.
• The different motor tracts and their clinical importance.
• Functional roles of the sensory tracts.
• Cerebral cortex – overview of the parietal & frontal lobes.
• Ocular examination – pursuits & saccades.
• Cranial nerves and their correlation to functional impairments in the brainstem; and how to examine for these deficits.
• Cerebellum: its function in motor control, motor adaptation, postural stabilisation and injury prevention.
• Cerebellar testing & introduction to neuro-rehabilitation.
• Introduction to pain: the concept of pain in the absence of tissue damage, mechanical allodynia and central pain modulation.

This seminar aims to enhance your understanding of the neurology that often underlies many of the musculoskeletal conditions commonly seen in clinical practice, especially those associated with muscle imbalances of the spine and/or limbs.

Course Content: 

• Fundamentals of neuronal function and dysfunction:
  • Principles of neuronal activation, inhibition and neuroplasticity.
  • Appropriate activation of neurons in order to produce neuroplasticity and avoid excitotoxicity.
  • Transneuronal degeneration.
• Activation of the nervous system through manual therapy:
  • Why mechanoreceptor-based afferent stimulation is so important for the health of the nervous system, for movement coordination and appropriate activation of postural and stabilising muscles.
  • Proprioceptive mechanoreceptors: their properties, how to activate them and how to optimise their function.
  • Spinal reflexes and their effects on muscle tone.
  • Addressing muscle tone imbalances through spinal reflex mechanisms.
  • Segmental and central neurological effects of spinal manipulation, mobilisation and soft tissue / myofascial therapies.
  • Clinical utilisation of spatial and temporal summation to increase neurological stimulation.
  • Overstimulation of the nervous system through manual therapy, adverse treatment responses and how to avoid these.
• Brainstem and cerebellar influences on muscle tone and postural control.
• Assessment and treatment of the cerebellum.
• Neurological considerations for common musculoskeletal conditions affecting the upper and lower limbs, including tendinosis and peripheral nerve entrapment syndromes.

We have all come across the patients who wake up in pain and claim they must have ‘slept funny’ (despite sleeping in the same position that they always do). Maybe we sometimes assume that patients just have a bad memory when they genuinely have no explanation for why their pain started. And then there are the patients who complain of severe stiffness, but have full range of movement in the affected body part and all orthopaedic tests are negative. Pain often has a considerable brain-based component and in the absence of injury or other inflammatory process can even be entirely brain-based; this is especially true for both acute and chronic spinal pain, as well as headaches.

Understanding how pain is perceived, processed, modulated and sometimes amplified by different regions of the brain and spinal cord is therefore extremely important for clinicians dealing with pain patients. Being able to determine which areas of the nervous system to either stimulate or calm down can help you be more specific in your treatment and rehabilitation interventions. This seminar will also help you to understand how different therapies are likely to influence pain in the brain, not just manual treatment interventions, but also neuro-rehabilitative exercises, and therapies commonly used in the multidisciplinary management of chronic pain.

Course Content: 
All of the following topics will be taught in clinical context. In other words, we will not just discuss theoretical concepts, but instead focus on what you can do in clinical practice to improve function in the neurological systems involved in pain processing and pain modulation.

• The concept of brain-based pain
• Nociceptive pathways from the periphery to the cerebral cortex
• Pain gating and descending modulation of nociceptive afferent input
• Wind-up, (mechanical) allodynia and central sensitisation
• Cognitive and emotional aspects of chronic pain
• Cerebellar and vestibular contributions to central pain modulation
• Influence of pain on proprioceptive function and motor control

For most manual therapists, the role of neurology in the diagnosis and treatment of headache orofacial pain is largely confined to ruling out serious pathology. There generally exists an understanding that the trigeminal pain pathway plays a major role. But very few practitioners have detailed knowledge of the neuro-pathophysiology underlying the different headache and orofacial pain disorders, thus making it difficult for them to comprehensively assess and treat the patient’s neuromusculoskeletal deficits that are contributing to their condition. This seminar will acquaint you with the mechanisms underlying headache and orofacial pain disorders and teach you how to clinically apply this knowledge in your assessment and treatments of patients.

Course Content: 

• Peripheral nociceptive inputs that can contribute to headaches and/or orofacial pain through sensitisation of the trigeminal pain pathway.
• Review of functional neuroanatomy of the trigeminal nerve.
• The neurological basis for cervicogenic headache and other common headache and orofacial pain disorders.
• Migraine pathophysiology – the neurological basis for the migraine aura and subsequent headache.
• Assessment of the headache patient: determining the pro-nociceptive factors and assessing the functionality of the anti-nociceptive mechanisms.
• Treatment and prevention of migraines and other headache disorders:
  • Manual therapy
  • Neuro-rehabilitation
  • Basic nutritional strategies
• Temporomandibular joint dysfunction:
  • Assessment
  • Treatment & rehabilitation
  • Influence on the vestibular system and association with other musculoskeletal pain syndromes

Neck pain is one of the most frequent presenting symptoms to practitioners of manual therapy (e.g. chiropractors, osteopaths, naprapaths, physiotherapists). Acute neck pain is often relatively easy to manage and usually resolves quickly. Chronic non-specific or traumatic neck pain, however, can be clinically challenging, as it is frequently associated with neurological dysfunction that exacerbates the problem and hinders recovery.

Whether you treat athletes involved in contact sports or mostly the ‘bread and butter patients’, this seminar will teach you how to assess and comprehensively rehabilitate patients with traumatic or chronic non-specific neck pain.

Course Content: 

• Soft tissue injury and alteration of spinal biomechanics after whiplash and concussion
• Neurological manifestations of cervical spine injury and chronic neck pain.
  Assessment & rehabilitation of:
  • Oculomotor dysfunction
  • Proprioceptive impairment
  • Balance & postural control
  • Prefrontal cortex dysfunction
• Autonomic & emotional dysregulation in traumatic and chronic neck pain patients
• Cervicogenic vertigo

A large number of patients suffering from vertigo, dizziness or balance disorders have great difficulty accessing the best possible treatment for their condition. Most medical doctors will only prescribe anti-sickness medication, and most chiropractors, physiotherapists and osteopaths do not have the knowledge to look beyond the cervical spine. Very few patients are given appropriate vestibular rehabilitation; and when it is prescribed, it is usually non-specific and frequently over-stimulates the patient. Consequently, improvement (if any) is slow, the treatment is unpleasant and compliance is poor.

As well as expanding your scope of practice to include vestibular disorders, this seminar will enable you to integrate treatment and rehabilitation of vestibular problems into your day-to-day musculoskeletal practice. Many patients with spinal or limb pains who present to practitioners of manual therapy also have vestibular symptoms or subclinical vestibular dysfunction that may hinder their recovery.

Course Content: 

• Diagnostic and general rehabilitation approach to vestibular signs and symptoms, and how to differentiate benign from pathological conditions.
• Assessment & individualised rehabilitation for specific conditions:
  • Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV)
  • Cervicogenic vertigo
  • Motion/travel sickness
  • Visual vertigo (e.g. supermarket aisles, watching fast-moving objects or movement on screens)
  • Persistent Postural-Perceptual Dizziness (PPPD)
  • Vestibular migraine
• Why spinal dysfunction or pain that develops as a consequence of vestibular-induced postural or muscle imbalances is unlikely to respond to manual therapy alone and usually requires vestibular rehabilitation to achieve more complete recovery.
• Understanding and avoiding post-treatment pain and sensations of disequilibrium, vertigo or dizziness as a result of manual-therapy-induced vestibular decompensation.
• The value of vestibular stimulation in patients with stress, chronic pain, anxiety and other causes of sympathetic nervous system overdrive.

Optimal movement necessitates optimal motor control. Optimal motor control is dependent upon motor automaticity, which is the ability to perform movements without directing attention toward the details of the movement. Compromised motor automaticity predisposes to injury, impaired athletic performance, and must be effectively restored during injury rehabilitation in order to reduce re-injury risk.

This seminar will discuss and demonstrate practical treatment, training and rehabilitation strategies for building motor automaticity. Specific topics will include enhancing sensorimotor processing, improving dynamic movement stabilisation and how to optimise motor learning. We will also explore the different facets of successful proprioceptive rehabilitation after sports injury, including the importance of restoring efficient central nervous system processing of proprioceptive information.

Furthermore, we will modify the strategies used to enhance sensorimotor processing and motor control in athletes and apply them to geriatric fall prevention.

Course Content: 

• Dynamic postural stabilisation: assessment of the systems involved & how to train them to function better
• Neurological principles of motor control and motor learning
• Cerebellar vs. cortical control of movement
• The cerebellum in:
  • Predictive control of movement
  • Rapid motor adaptations
  • Motor timing & surround inhibition
• The importance of proximal stabilisation and eccentric control
• Implicit vs. explicit motor learning
• Proprioceptive vs. visual sensory reliance
• How to promote cerebellar control of movement for athletic performance, injury prevention and injury rehabilitation
• Falls in the elderly: causes, prevention, and rehabilitation strategies
• Components of proprioceptive rehabilitation
• Restoring efficient central nervous system processing of proprioceptive information
• Post-injury gamma gain deficits and strategies for their rehabilitation

These are comprised of several modules taught online or in-person by Darren Barnes-Heath. Please visit https://www.newlandchiropractic.co.uk/services/developing-brains/developing-brains-seminars/ for further information and booking.

Poland (taught in English with consecutive translation into Polish):
https://www.syntonic.pl/en/courses/ii-edition/basic

Denmark (taught in English): Please contact Charlotte Giuliani for course information and dates info@din-boernekiropraktor.dk