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Arthritis Pain Relief in Your Swim Spa
Not Just Your Grandma’s Arthritis
Osteoarthritis (OA) is the most common form of arthritis. There's a 50-50 chance that at some point in your life, you are going to develop osteoarthritis. I would not buy a lottery ticket with those odds!
In OA the strong, flexible substance that cushions your joints called cartilage begins to break down, leading to symptoms such as pain, stiffness, swelling particularly in the joints of the knee, hip, spine, hands and feet. Even though the cause of OA is unknown, age, gender, excess body weight, previous joint injury, occupation and genetics are all contributing factors.
Over the past decade knee replacement surgeries have tripled in the 45-to-64 age group because of OA.
One of the most effective ways to treat OA is to exercise. Your swim spa is one of the most comfortable and effective places a person with arthritis can exercise. Here’s why:
Water significantly reduces the impact on your joints making it much easier to move.
Water allows improved joint flexibility, which will improve range of motion and general mobility.
Water provides up to 12-15 times the resistance of air, allowing you to really strengthen your muscles and bones.
Your swim spas warm water and jets will aide in reducing any pain associated with OA.
Your spas current or jetted system can assist to improve cardiovascular fitness, calorie burning and weight loss.
The water 3 dimensional surrounding properties can help improve your balance, coordination and walking mechanics which then can transfer to land.
Your swim spa obviously provides significant benefits from a low impact standpoint. However, it is also a great place to get a high intensity workout.
A recent study with patients who suffered from OA and participated in a 6 week high intensity aquatic workout reduced joint pain and improved balance, function, and their overall mobility
Your swim spa can help to significantly alleviate and improve the symptoms associated with Osteoarthritis.
It is not necessarily the Fountain of Youth, but it’s pretty close.
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Dr. Rick McAvoy, PT, DPT, CSCS has specialized in Aquatic Physical Therapy, Fitness and Sports Performance for over 25 years. Rick is the Owner of Swim Spa Exercise, a virtual training company to help people maximize the use of their swim spas. He wants everyone to Move Better and Live Better.
For more information of how to maximize the use of your Swim Spa and how to Move Better and Live Better visit.
Weight Loss Using Your Swim Spa
As you are probably aware, obesity is a major issue in the world today. A significant number of people struggle with weight management. Trying to improve physical activity and diet is a constant battle for many.
An increase in body weight coupled with a sedentary lifestyle will often lead to greater health risks as well.
Regular exercise with a balanced diet can help you control your weight, reduce your risk of heart disease and certain cancers, and strengthen your bones and muscles. Not to mention improve your overall mood and sense of well being.
Taking your workout into your swim spa can easily help start you on your weight loss journey. Exercising in the water has been shown to be a great calorie burner and no matter what age, weight, or fitness level, anyone can perform and benefit from water exercise.
Here’s a few more reasons why your swim spa should be the place to begin your weight loss journey.
Water Training is Low Impact: The waters buoyancy allows for reduced impact on your joints. In fact, when standing in waist-deep water, you only weigh approximately 50% of your body weight.
This reduced weight bearing is one of the many advantages of exercising in water, it allows people to perform activities that are not always possible on land such as jogging.
A study in the Journal of Obesity looked at the effects of aqua jogging in obese adults and concluded that subjects who performed jogging in the water had reduced their body fat and waist size, and improved their overall aerobic fitness and quality of life.
More Flexibility/Less Soreness: Warm water will help to improve the flexibility of those tight muscles that you have developed over the years. With less gravity there is less risk of muscle soreness which will increase your exercise tolerance. In the water you are able to exercise everyday without increased muscle soreness.
Water Provides Accommodating Resistance: I like to refer to the water as “The Great Equalizer” meaning the harder you push against the water, the harder the water pushes you back. So no matter what fitness level you are, you control the amount of resistance which is a very safe and effective way to train. This forces your muscles to work harder, helping you burn fat and tone muscles more quickly than land-based exercise programs.
Burn Calories: Because of the added resistance in the water, you’re actually working harder than you would on land to complete the same exact movements, even if it doesn’t feel like that.
Research studies that compared upper and lower body workouts performed on land versus in the water, showed that exercises performed in water created a higher energy output than on land. These studies also explained the benefits of water exercise where both the upper and lower body movements were combined in the water, utilizing full body movements thereby expending more energy and burning more calories.
Exercising in warm water also increases your body temperature and burns even more calories during your workout.
Vertical aquatic exercise depending on your intensity has been shown to burn up to 400-600 calories in an hour!
It’s Fun: Exercising in the water does not really feel like you are exercising. You can’t feel yourself sweating and mentally you leave the water in a much better mood than when you got in. If an activity is fun people usually tend to stick with it
It’s Convenient: There are a significant number of people who are very intimidated to join a gym never mind the feeling of putting on a bathing suit in public! It has been shown that over half of people who join a gym do not attend consistently. Exercising in your swim spa in the privacy of your own home will make things so much easier and your weight loss goals more attainable.
Exercise is Medicine
In 2007, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) and the American Medical Association (AMA) co-launched Exercise is Medicine
The goal of this organization is to create a broad awareness that exercise can be as powerful as any pharmaceuticals in preventing and treating a range of chronic diseases and medical conditions.
As a health care professional for over 30 years specializing in aquatics I couldn’t agree more that Swim Spa Exercise is Medicine!
Dr. Rick McAvoy, PT, DPT, CSCS has specialized in Aquatic Physical Therapy, Fitness and Sports Performance for over 25 years. Rick is the Owner of Swim Spa Exercise, a virtual training company to help people maximize the use of their swim spas. He wants everyone to Move Better and Live Better.
For more information of how to maximize the use of your Swim Spa and how to Move Better and Live Better visit.
Swim Spa Exercise Blog
Swim Spas-More Than Just Swimming
When you mention swim spas, the first activity that obviously comes to mind is swimming.
However, there is so much more that you can do in your swim spa.
A Few Quick Points:
The Water is the Great Equalizer
The harder you push in the water, the harder the water pushes back. Water provides an accommodating resistance. So no matter what fitness level you are, as long you are working your hardest, the water will give you a great workout.
The Water Does Not Discriminate
No matter what age or fitness level you are, the water will provide maximum benefit to help your overall health and/or performance.
The Water is More Holistic
Training in the water allows you to work multiple areas simultaneously. Even the most basic exercise such as walking forward in the water-improves your balance, coordination, trains the core muscles, increases your flexibility, strength and boosts cardiovascular fitness.
Swim Spas Propulsion System
Incorporating the swim spas propulsion system creates a much more challenging training effect and brings a very different dynamic compared to that a traditional pool.
Given my 25 plus years specializing in aquatics I feel that if more people realized the full potential of water there would be much less injury and illness and we would have a health revolution.
If you would like to learn about how to maximize the use of you swim spa to move better and feel better visit:
5 Common Compensations when Incorporating Upper Body Drag Equipment
When integrating drag equipment into your clients routine there are common compensations that become evident and can be corrected with proper cueing.
Grip: Most clients will tend to grip the handles of the gear too tight. This will cause increase wrist and forearm discomfort when exercising. You may also note that their wrist position is not neutral but will flex and extend as they move. A cue would be “Try to keep your wrists straight but your grip loose as you move”
Posture: Most people myself included don’t have the best posture. Because we are very patterned individuals and tend to sit too much we develop that typical forward head and rounded shoulder posture. When using resistive gear in the water this can become further accentuated because the waters buoyancy and resistance act on the body simultaneously. Cueing for a proper chin tuck with a chest lift will cause facilitation of the lower trapezius musculature which will help with proper postural alignment
Core Stability: Incorporating upper body resistive equipment significantly challenges core stability. If the proximal stability of the core lacks control then the distal mobility of the extremities will cause increased compensation. One common compensation is that the body will rock back and forth with upper body movements. To correct this there are a few options. Remove the equipment so that proper alignment can be maintained during the exercise then gradually reintroduce. You can also slow the movement down enough so that proper core stability can be maintained and controlled.
Limited Range of Motion: When clients are cued to perform exercises at an increased speed we usually notice a reduced ROM .This happens because the client is try to go at a faster rate so they limit the motion to increase the speed of the exercise. Only have the client move as fast as they can with full equal motion.
Pattern: Common substitution patterns that I notice frequently are increased upper trapezius activation, this is demonstrated by the client shoulders being significantly elevated during exercise.
Pattern dominance is exhibited when a client is performing an exercise such as a push/pull exercise. A client will very often push out much more forcefully with the dominant anterior musculature and pull back with less force with the weaker posterior chain musculature.
When incorporating upper body resistive equipment I recommend what I call the 3 P’s: Pattern, Posture, Power.
First, teach the Pattern, Second cue for the Posture and Third integrate Power into the Movement.
Train in 3D, No glasses required
3-dimensional functional training has always been a major focus of mine. As a physical therapist I have to develop functional training programs for clients who need to return to work, sport and overall quality of life.
My education in 3D functional training came early while I was attending the University of Connecticut. One of my professors there was David Tiberio who together with Gary Gray are pioneers in the field of functional training. Both Gary and David offer functional training education though the Gray Institute.
The Certification in Applied Functional Science is a great course through the Gray Institute that I highly recommend to anyone especially those specializing in aquatics. It will help to maximize the use of the water with your clients or athletes.
Why is 3D training important?
As Gary Gray explains human beings are three-dimensional: “We’re capable of moving in three planes of motion — forward and back, side to side, and rotationally. But it goes further than that: We’re also muscles, bones, and nerves. We can express strength, endurance, and power. And we’re mind, body, and spirit. If we leave any of those dimensions out, then we’re not training the whole person.”
We are very patterned individuals. We tend to sit too much during the day and most times if and when we exercise we incorporate straight plane type movements. This tends to lead to muscle imbalance, joint dysfunction and hence injury.
By incorporating the water, functional gains can be made faster incorporating 3D training because:
Water provides three-dimensional resistance inherently, so the muscular and neurological systems receive a more comprehensive training effect than land.
In the water, the focus can be on both flexibility and strength/stability at the same time. This will assist in reducing muscle imbalances and improving posture and function on land.
The ability to target movements not just muscles. Because of the waters surrounding properties clients and athletes are able to train functional movement patterns easier than on land
One of the most important things that I think the water provides is the benefits to train the nervous system.
Muscle imbalances can cause increased inhibition which leads to increased apprehension. By decreasing muscle inhibition it will lead to decreased apprehension and produce cleaner movements.
Because water is a surrounding proprioceptively enriched medium, it provides increased kinesthetic feedback. This feedback helps to clean up dysfunctional movement patterns.
So the next time you are training clients in the water, try to remember and incorporate a 3D philosophy. For example, can the client perform an exercise in which the arms are moving in one plane while the legs are moving in another? I think you will find it challenging as well as beneficial for your client or athletes.
Bridging the Gap Between Water and Land
Almost everyday I witness the power that water has influencing peoples lives. I see people in aquatic exercise classes smiling and feeling incredible with a freedom of movement not always experienced on land. However, when they exit the pool they are influenced by gravity and momentum which usually puts them in the same state that they were before getting into the water. These programs are obviously fun but will it help them functionally on land?
Over the past 25 years working in aquatics, I have worked with clients of all levels and abilities, from neurological disorders all the way up to professional and world-class athletes. I believe the pool should be fun but foremost functional. By performing functional aquatic training it will help to “bridge the gap” between water and land based training.
Functional training should focus on movements not just muscles. Functional training should be individual to a persons goals but it usually does encompass a few common components such as multi-planar and multi-joint actions that recruit the body’s stabilizers synergistically to facilitate correct movement. These programs should include core strength, flexibility, balance and coordinated movements to mention a few.
Integrating functional training into the water is much easier if we try to think more functionally.
A few thoughts:
Core Strength:
Core strength is the basis of most all exercise. It is not possible for the arms and legs to produce more force than the core is able to stabilize. Because of the waters unique properties it provides kinesthetic feedback to assist with core stability. Having clients perform movements such as push/pulls or rotation can be easily transitioned to land by incorporating body weight, bands, balls or even light weights.
Flexibility:
Flexibility should be established in all 3 planes of motion to have proper muscle balance and strength. In the water the focus can be on both flexibility and strength/stability at the same time. This will assist in reducing muscle imbalances and improving posture and function on land.
Balance/Coordination:
Coordinated upper and lower body movements can enhance both flexibility/mobility and hence function. Functional training should incorporate controlled amounts of instability such as in single leg exercises. The water’s properties helps to improve balanced coordinated movement patterns that may be more challenging to achieve on land.
Remember,the body moves in three planes of motion. Even though we move usually in one plane of motion at a time (forward/backward/sideways), we have to have stability in the other two planes. Because water is a surrounding 3-dimensional medium it provides this inherently so the muscular and neurological systems receive a more comprehensive training effect.
When developing aquatic fitness programs, try to think functionally. Water has its place but we function on land. You can still have fun in the water but if you integrate functional components into your program you will have clients that perform better on land as well. And honestly isn't that what it is all about?
Aquatics for Better Movement
I had the opportunity to attend and present at the 21st Boston Sports Medicine Symposium this past weekend. It was a great opportunity to listen to a great panel of speakers including the top orthopedic surgeons and therapists in the industry.
Topics included surgical and rehabilitation techniques of the shoulder, hip and knee.
As I sat and listened to these fantastic presenters I realized that the surgical and rehab techniques have significantly changed over the past few years.
I thought about how aquatics has changed somewhat, but not at all at the rate of other areas in rehab and training. The water continues to be viewed as more of the last resort as opposed to the first option for rehab and training.
A big take away form the symposium was to get patients and athletes moving early but in a safe and proprioceptively enriched manner.
I couldn’t help but think about how aquatics could be incorporated to get patients and athletes moving both earlier and safer.
A few of my thoughts:
Injured or post op clients and athletes can get moving much earlier and more functionally in a 3-Dimensional closed kinetic chain fashion.
Because of waters unique surrounding properties it provides a dynamic proprioceptively enriched environment to rehabilitate and train.
The positive resistance that the water provides causes concentric contractions to be dominant which will create much less stress in the beginning stages of strengthening. This also will reduce muscle soreness. Water provides an accommodating resistance which allows a much safer way to train without the input of weights or bands.
Another benefit that I am not sure we think about is that when we stop engaging a muscle in the water, the motion immediately stops. On land gravity and momentum still influences movement which increases the potential risk for injury.
The body is a great substituter. When clients and athletes are injured their bodies will always take the easy way out by substituting movement patterns to avoid pain and further injury. In the water the body is both unloaded enough but also resisted enough to help correct these compensatory patterns.
The ability to target movements not just muscles. Because of the waters surrounding properties clients and athletes are able to train functional movement patterns easier than on land.
Our aquatic rehab and training programs should continue to evolve to keep up with the healthcare and sports performance industries advancements.
