Conferences & Workshops

UIC Workshops

On April 14, 2016, UIC had the privilege of hosting Ryan Mertz at our weekly seminar. This fellow has my (and probably everyone else in the room that day!) dream job! Ryan Mertz is the Chicago Cubs full-time Physical Therapist. Prior to landing a job with what would be the World Series Champions Cubbies of 2016, he worked for the dark side as a part-time PT of the Chicago White Sox. Fun fact: The Chicago Cubs is the only professional sports team that works with ATI Physical Therapy (all of the rest are through Athletico).

Photo: Justin Payette, PT, DPT, SCS, CSCS (left) & Ryan Mertz, PT, DPT, CSCS (Right). Photo Courtesy of Valere Guertin, SPT (another awestruck classmate)

SPT Lessons:

Ryan was the first PT I met who has a CSCS (you have to remember that I was only a 2nd year student!). After doing the research, I learned how to get the certified speciality in Strength & Conditioning. If I choose outpatient PT, that will be an easy to-do. Here's more information on the speciality certification.
I'm pretty sure that Ryan is one of the key guys that played a HUGE role in getting Kyle Schwarber back to the designated hitter position in the 2016 World Series! Full tears of the ACL & LCL do not recover in that short of time without prestigious care.

UIC Lecture Series

On November 11, 2016, UIC hosted Dr. Joshua Cleland as the 11th Annual Distinct Lecture of the Science of Manual Therapy. Although we were in the process of learning manual therapy in our musculoskeletal course & had only covered upper and lower extremity techniques thus far, this would be a preview of what was to come during our spring semester. Retrospectively, he shared

SPT Lessons:

Manipulation versus Mobilization? According to the evidence presented that day, for cervical spine, there's moderate evidence showing that performing either a mobilization or manipulation at the cervical spine will equally improve patient outcomes when indicated. For the thoracic region, manipulation > manipulation. For lumbar spine, (surprisingly) there are mixed reviews whether if mobilization or manipulation is the preferred choice.
When performing manual therapy, aim for the painful areas related to the patient's symptoms, but do not worry that you have to be perfectly specific. We dwell so much time in class on knowing exactly what segment we are on, but Josh challenges those specifics.
Get rid of using the old & invalid terms such as "I will be fixing your alignment." or telling your patient that you are putting "something back in place." Patients & friends of mine still say to me that they are going for adjustments. Read this article.

Combined Sections Meeting 2017

February 2017 marked the very first Combined Sections Meeting (CSM) for myself and several of my classmates. Held in glorious San Antonio, TX, this shift into the southwest shellshocked our windy city bodies as we boarded the planes like eskimos & arrived in the southern sun.

They have the saying of "Over-prepare & go with the flow." That is basically how we were each day with selecting sessions. Although we had an idea of what we wanted to attend, plans changed.

While taking my teaching elective during the spring semester, I was in awe with the book Teaching and Learning in Physical Therapy: From Classroom to Clinic by Drs. Margaret Plack & Maryanne Driscoll (all pictured below). Therefore, I had to meet them! They had the most engaging sessions of all CSM! It made me rethink so much on how to engage learning both inside the classroom in presentations as well as for my patients in the clinic.

SPT Lessons:

Know your learner! How do you learn best? Do you know how each of your patients learn best? It is not always the same; thus, you must modify how you work with your patient.
Begin with the end in mind. If you want to look at it in a different perspective, keep your eye on the prize. What are your patient's goals and how are you going to get there? The goals will be pre-assessed and re-assessed, thus the initial evaluation should paint a picture of the necessary tests & measures that you suspect to improve by the end of therapy.
Growth vs. Fixed Mindsets. Dr. Plack talked about how we can fall under two different types of mindsets: a fixed mindset, where you believe your basic qualities are simply fixed traits, or a growth mindset, where your basic abilities can be developed through persistence and hard work. Go ahead and test your mindset: https://mindsetonline.com/testyourmindset/

Saturday, we were pleasantly surprised on what we signed up for the session on #SocialPT with Brett Kestenbaum, Ben Fung, Greg Todd, UIC's very own cardiopulmonary professor - Rich Severin. Thanks to these heavy hitters of social media, they inspired me to revive my Twitter account (@SaraEmilySPT), helped get our profession TREND on social media, and start a fire in our souls to promote social responsibility (a core value in PT)!

SPT Lessons:

The PT Profession currently has an identity crisis. The perspective of what people think that physical therapy entails oftentimes differs significantly to what we provide and offer.
Did you know that: there are PTs that treat dizziness & balance troubles (Shout out to Good Life PT Rehab). There are some PT clinics that specialize in treating several types of headaches. Some PTs specialize in treating incontinence (which is a common but not a normal part of aging). Read more here.

Proud Professor photo of Dr. Rich Severin (@ptreviewer) with 3 of his UIC CO 2018 students.

They always say that you will unexpectedly run into some big names in physical therapy. Dr. Michael Wong created the PhysioU (Clinical Pattern Recognition) App that we have been using in our musculoskeletal dysfunction course. Sure enough, he was inside the exhibit hall and valued our student feedback on how to improve the application/website to make it more user friendly and include information that we find valuable.

Check out the app & even get a free trial: http://www.physiou.com/

Combined Sections Meeting 2018

Graciously through the support of the Illiniois Physical Therapy Association (after writing a

International Conference for Vestibular Rehabilitation

My first physical therapy conference as a doctor of physical therapy!