♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists ♪
♪ On the internet. ♪
- Hi, folks, I'm Bob Schrupp physical therapist,
- Brad Heineck physical therapist
- We are the most famous physical therapists
on the internet.
- In our opinion of course Bob.
- we're gonna show you how to use a TENS unit
with hamstring pain or strain.
We're going to show you a correct pad placement.
Now, Brad,
by the way I should mention that,
at the end of the video today,
we're actually going to show you one treatment,
that is not TENS related,
that you can try because it's often very effective
with hamstring problems.
- Right.
- We're just throwing that in as a bonus.
When you wanna use a TENS unit,
the problem we have is that there are
literally hundreds of them out there.
And Brad and I have tried dozens and dozens,
and we decided after trying all these,
and a lot of them are great.
- Right.
- I think a lot of them are fantastic.
Some don't have very good instructions.
- Sure. - Could you agree with that?
- Yeah. I mean.
- What are you gonna do?
So anyway,
we decided after much deliberation
that we're gonna endorse one type of brand,
and we decided we're gonna endorse the iReliev,
do you want to show the box Brad?
- Oh sure. Here we go.
- So we went over,
and if you look on our website.
If you go to our website,
go to BobandBrad.com,
and then go to programs,
then under programs go to the TENS.
- Yap.
- And under the TENS,
you'll find that we give you step by step instructions
for the 1313 model.
- Right.
- The 5050 model and the 8080 model.
So, plus if you buy one,
they're gonna have instructions too.
They're very good instructions.
That's part of the reasons - Right.
- Why we endorsed them.
- But we like our instructions better.
- Yeah, our instructions are better,
coz they're visual.
You can see
- They're from us. What else can we say.
- So with that,
you'll be able to know how to use the TENS unit.
We're gonna show you where to place the pads.
Now the pads,
the whole issue with the pads,
is that it's an experiment.
There's not an absolute correct right.
- And we're gonna give general locations,
that usually work for a lot of people.
But yours may vary.
- Right.
Typical TENS unit, you're gonna have the unit.
Brad you wanna show us - Yes.
- And then quite often what you'll have is two leads.
Brad showing one right there. - Here's one.
- Yep, the other one's in the box.
- Yeah.
- We're not gonna put the other one in.
We could I suppose, but you know the other one,
simply goes right there.
- And the lead goes from channel one,
down to two pads,
and then from channel two down to two pads,
- Right, so a total of four pads.
If you use both channels, you don't have to.
- So we're gonna show you first,
where to place,
let's say is a small area of pain on the hamstring.
So you're gonna use just two pads.
- You're right.
- So we're gonna show that first, Brad's gonna have to,
I don't know do you wanna chair, Brad?
- No, don't worry about I just,
- We didn't mark an X did we?
Oh, we did?
- Yeah. Its there - Its there, okay
- So let's say Bob tore his hamstring,
right there in that specific spot, it's real painful,
we're going to, if as a therapist,
I may put that right there,
or I could put it below.
So on the pain or below or above the pain,
we could go medial or to the inside or lateral,
or to the outside.
And it's one of those things you experiment with,
it depends on which combination
offers the best pain control,
or it may also, maybe let's say put it here,
and it makes it the hamstrings contract a lot.
And it's kind of bothering you,
the muscles are contracting.
Then you may put it here,
it may manage the pain well,
and avoid so much muscle contraction.
And you'll know what I'm talking about,
after you work with this for very short period of time.
- Right.
Now the next option is you could actually put one
below the pain.
- You're right.
- Am I below it?
- Yep, you're below it.
- And then you coud put one above the pain.
- Right. So you know,
you may go with the muscle fiber there, there and there,
you may go across it like this.
I mean, you could go at a diagonal if you'd like to.
- Sure
You can go side to side did you mention that
- Right, and sometimes, yeah, side to side.
To be honest with you, you know,
if you put them on yourself on your hamstring,
it may be where you can reach
is gonna have some influence on it.
- And generally,
we like to have at least the pads width between the two.
- Yes, this would be too close.
That's a good point Bob.
I'm glad you brought that up.
So you know, over here is pretty far,
on the other hand, you don't wanna go too far apart.
- Right
- Down here would be too far.
Usually three to four inches maximum,
the width your hand maybe is a good rule of thumb.
- You wanna show with four pads Brad now.
So channel one is yellow.
We put the tape on there,
just so you could distinguish
between channel one and channel two.
- This is what they look like normally, just black.
- Yeah, the ones from iReliev.
And then channel two is green.
- Yep, so.
- He's gonna show,
is it the cross you're showing first Brad?
- Yeah, up and down and right to left.
That's a pigtail.
Now obviously,
these aren't gonna be connected
to the pigtails or the wires.
So there'd be the wires here too.
I'm just not doing it for demonstration,
so it's a little easier.
So we could go that way.
We could go like this, here and here,
and there, and there.
It gets you a pattern like that.
- Yeah, if you want there's a printout
with the program on our website.
So there's a PDF that has pictures of this
- Sure
- Shows the different settings
- Right, so you can just print it off.
You don't have to go back to our video and.
- Right. - Listen to us all the time.
- Now you could do as a final option.
I can't see these very good,
but you could put the two green ones down here.
if you're getting pain all the way down.
You could put one on your buttock.
- Yep.
- And one right here.
- Right
- And then two more lined up here,
basically four like right lined up they're in a row.
- Right that's it you know,
if you got that sciatica symptoms,
- Yeah.
- Runs down the leg and you know,
could all the way go down to your ankle.
You could put two here.
- Yeah, I've known people that,
put one on their back.
One right here.
- Yep. - And then put two down here.
- Sure.
So it's kind of
- Yeah, it's reasonably flexible,
it's a matter of working with it,
and you'll you'll learn quickly.
- All right,
let's show what our one treatment recommendation is Brad.
- Oh, yes.
- So, by the time this video comes out,
I'm hoping that we have our own massagers.
But these are handheld massagers.
And they're battery operated.
So what's really nice is they recharge,
but they have what we call some percussion.
They don't just vibrate,
they actually percuss.
This one is the less expensive model.
And we'll have a bottom bred less expensive model too, but
- It doesn't mean it's not good?
It just doesn't, It's not as aggressive.
- You wanna show that one Brad.
And they're also the massage gun.
Now they really get in deep.
- For the hamstrings,
probably this one is gonna be better.
This one is just,
doesn't have the power.
- The power together to get in there.
- But it is still, it's gonna be effective.
I've used this on my hamstrings.
If I was gonna do it on my wrist,
I would probably want this one and not that one
- Yeah, I've used that one on my piriformis.
I've had my people use it on their piriformis,
I should say, not mine.
- Patients. - Yeah.
And it worked out fine for that.
But this one actually.
And the one we're gonna be having,
I believe is gonna have
like 10 settings, yeah. - 10 settings, yeah.
So, but you can see this thing can really get in there.
- Yeah
- And we'd like to go across the fibers.
- Yep.
- The fibers run this way, I like to go across them.
- There is different theories on going in line,
or across. - Right.
- You will hear that from depending on which therapist
or whichever book you read.
- And a lot of problems especially the chronic ones,
are the ones where they attached to the sit bones,
the hamstring.
- Yeah, that's way up - This is what's nice
about this it can get really get in there.
I mean, you can hand massage with your own hand,
but I'll tell you fatigue rapidly,
while this you can do for half hour,
and not even bat an eyelash, You know I mean.
- Your arm might get a little tired.
- Your arm might get a little tired but
you give yourself breaks you'll be fine.
- You have plenty of massage don't worry about that.
- Right,
- well done.
- Alright, check out the rest of the videos
in the series on TENS if they apply to you,
- Alright