♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists ♪
♪ On the internet ♪
- Hi folks, I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
- Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- Together we are the most famous physical therapists
on the internet.
- In our opinion of course.
- Not appreciated in our time Brad.
Geniuses are like that,
they're usually appreciated after they're dead.
- Oh, like Ernest van Gogh.
- Oh God, I don't know.
- Sorry. Let's get on with our program.
- Title today: Why you need to strengthen these muscles
to improve your balance.
We'll get into it right after this.
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Brad, do you want to show it?
- Oh yeah. Let's show the mini Q2 massager.
- Yeah, it is awesome. It's small, but it's very powerful.
- It is. It does a job.
- I'm spitting today. Do you notice that?
- Oh, don't worry about it.
- Okay. You can also find it on Facebook,
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Go to Twitter, Instagram, TikTok.
What else do we got Brad?
I don't know. Zen something.
- Yeah, we got the podcast.
- Podcast. Yeah.
- Hopefully you can find it.
- So, much of your balance comes from your hips
and your ankles.
- Absolutely.
- So if either of those are weak,
you're gonna possibly have trouble with your balance.
- Absolutely. Yeah, that was our key.
I learned that in PT school 25 years ago
and I think it still holds true.
- Right? So we're going to show you beginner
and advanced for doing these.
- Sure.
- So should we jump into it, Brad?
- Well, we'll just take our time.
- Alright. Let's start off with the beginner.
Now this is really standard.
In fact, I can't remember who has a balanced program,
but this is what they recommend. Most of these, anyway.
Hip abduction, very simple.
Grab behind a chair and you just start going out,
keeping the toe straight forward,
and you're going to work on-
- [Brad] Not like this.
- [Bob] Yep. And this is probably going to be
enough for you to start.
If you're, you know, a beginner and you're elderly
or you've never done these before
- [Brad] Don't do them like this.
- [Bob] Don't do them like that.
And of course you're going to want to do both sides.
- [Brad] Yeah. Otherwise-
- And I'd say, what, 15 Brad?
- [Brad] You can start out with 10
and see if you get sore the next day.
- Sure.
- [Brad] If not, 15 is a good goal.
- Sit to stance.
Brad and I have talked about this many times.
In fact, we talk about people who have
one of those chairs that help them stand up.
- The lift chair, the recliner-lift chair
with a nice button. My mom has one.
- Right.
- I bought her one.
- Yeah. And they, you know,
if they have to use it, they should.
But they should only use it as high as they need
to get out of the chair,
because you're going to get weak.
Sit to stands are really important.
So, you know, when you're gonna get out of chair
just rip off five of them.
- Rip off five, that's a good way to put it.
- So you're going to start off, you may be a little weak,
and you could start off using your arms
and just standing up.
In fact, Brad and I said if you do have trouble standing
you could actually use a cushion to start off with.
Brad's got one right there.
- [Brad] Yeah. You could use a cushion.
You could use a pillow.
We've got a Pete's Choice cushion, they work really well.
But you can use a pillow or something else you have.
Just to get one inch higher makes significant difference.
- Oh, big difference.
I've had many patients who couldn't get out of a chair
and we'd just put a cushion like this in
and then boom. Plopped out of there.
- Yep. They're rocking and then you do this
and, "Oh."
- So this is a whole progression.
I mean, you can start going down to one arm.
You can start going down to
putting your hands on your thighs.
- There you go.
- You can start going to the advance,
putting the arms out this way.
- Notice we try and maintain good posture.
- Yeah, good posture.
Try not to lean way forward here.
You're trying to come up straight here,
that's going to get more strength then.
- If you happen to use a walker,
a four-wheeled walker or the regular one,
you know, have it in front of you to get started.
So that in case you do get up,
and you want something to hold on to,
that's a really good safe option.
- Yep. All right. Next one, Brad.
Since we're seated, why don't you to do the alphabet?
We're going to strengthen the ankle a little bit here.
- Oh sure.
- So as Brad says, you should picture
like a piece of chalk tied to your big toe, right?
- Yes, I use the big toe. Yes. The great toe.
- And what you're going to do is
you're going to draw out the letters of the alphabet
using the capital letters.
- Yep. Like you got that chalkboard and start with an "A".
- Then go to the "B" and then a "C."
- And you want big capital letters
because it gives better range of motion.
I just found much better luck with that
with patients over the time.
Because they say,
"Boy, I got up to "E" and my ankle was tired".
And after you do it a week or two
you'll get up to "M", or "P", or whatever.
It's very clear, your progress.
- That's what's nice about it, you know where you progress,
you know that you're doing better.
All right. How about, Brad, do you want to do zigzags?
- ABC's aren't just for kids, you know, by the way.
- Oh, they aren't. Apparently not.
- What are we going to do?
- You want to do zigzags?
- Oh yeah. This is one of my favorites.
This is the easiest way to get the small muscles
in your foot and the muscles out on the side,
the lateral muscles, stronger, which are really critical.
If you need something to hang on to,
or you can go up to a cupboard,
- [Bob] Countertop.
- countertop, put your hands on there for balance.
So you have to use your imagination.
Use a cane. I got the Booyah Stik.
And so, you know, people our age
or who may be doing this, may know of the Charleston.
- [Bob] Yeah.
- Yeah. This is kind of like that,
but it's a little different.
You should do this with shoes on.
You can go barefoot, but it depends
if you had carpet or a hard floor or not.
- [Bob] Yeah. It's nice.
The shoes give you a little resistance on the carpet.
- And take your time at first,
because sometimes I've had patients
and they kind of get mixed up
because it's not easy for everyone.
So just think about pointing your toes that way,
and then pointing your toes this way.
And you know, this carpet, you can't see it on video,
but this carpet has sections that are two foot long.
So I'm going to go four feet.
So from here to here, I can see it's four feet.
Just to give you a visual goal.
Otherwise, if you're just out there
doing them for any length, sometimes...
- [Bob] Yeah. Pick a number of repetitions,
how many times you're going to go back and forth,
and then you'll be all set for the next one.
- You'll get fatigued on that.
- Yeah, you will.
And next one is, again, back of the chair or countertop,
you're going to... I suppose you want to follow me.
Heel up, then toes up.
And then you can go to one
if you want to really get advanced here.
- [Brad] Now, a little warning.
If you want to put both toes down
or both feet down, then just stop with the toes up.
Nope.
- [Bob] Oh. Toes up.
- [Brad] Yep. Now a lot of people, not a lot,
there'll be certain people that are going to
feel like they're gonna fall backward at this.
- [Brad] And if you're doing that, don't do it,
or do it at a countertop or the kitchen sink
where you can put your hands around something.
I have patients. And I'll say, if they are wobbly that way,
and there was any concern, you know,
do it with a chair behind.
- [Bob] Sure.
- [Brad] So that if you do lose your balance
- You can just end up going right into the chair.
- [Brad] Yeah. Versus falling down on yourself.
- I mean, that's why we're having you do it,
actually, is because people sometimes
lose their balance backwards like that.
And this just gives you a little more strength
so that hopefully that won't happen.
And we want to do it under controlled conditions.
- That's right. Be safe, be safe.
- So let's do some advanced ones now.
So we're using these bands here.
Exercise- What are they? Resistance bands.
Yeah. They're called resistance bands.
We call them, sometimes, booty bands.
Because if you want to improve your booty,
that's your butt, Brad,
you got to go ahead and give some resistance.
- It's simply a small loop.
We like these because they're wide,
they're not made out of latex or the rubbery stretchy stuff.
Those roll up around your legs, they're uncomfortable.
- Yeah.
- And we discovered these, and we absolutely love them.
And that's why we promote them. We have our name on them.
I'm going to not use that one.
- Why don't you show that one, Brad, standing abduction
and I'll show it lying down?
- Yep. Yeah.
That's good. You've got two options.
Now you can put these, it has to go above your knee caps.
If it's there, you could go lower,
but for this situation we'll go above the knees.
And the higher you move it up towards your waist
the less resistance.
This is not that hard, a little resistance.
And move it to here, a lot more.
So, you'll get used to that once you work with it.
- So, yeah. And if you want to make it even harder,
you do it lying down.
And you get resistance that way,
and you've got gravity working against you too.
- There you go.
- A lot of gravity.
You can also do, actually, do clamshells.
- Sure.
- So you put your ankles together
and you're opening the clam.
- [Brad] Yep. Good old clamshell.
You can't go wrong with the clamshell Bob.
- That's right.
And then we're going to go ahead
and work the buttock a little bit, the gluteus maximus.
So we're going to go ahead.
You can do it prone lying down like this.
You can lift up like this. You got to bend the knee.
Brad? You got to bend the knee?
- Yeah. Right here.
You want me to bend the knee too?
- Yeah.
Otherwise you can do it in the quad position,
a lot more difficult. A lot more difficult.
- There's no change with standing. You only have one option.
- Yep. So you're going to want to, of course,
do both legs again.
- Sure.
- And don't try to walk around with these.
Again, 10 repetitions. Up to 15.
If you want to go that high, that's fine.
Make sure you relax and breathe through all that.
I should have mentioned that at the beginning.
- Now, as you slide it down slide it right to your ankle,
and you should have shoes on for this,
and you put it around the forefeet.
And this is a great way of working eversion,
ankle turning out.
And this is the one that you really want to strengthen.
Now you can do one at a time where one of them just holds,
but it's just easier to do both.
- [Brad] And if your ankles are weak
and you can't see seem like you're stretching the band
very far, that's okay.
Just, even in isometric, just push as hard as you can.
- [Bob] You can just hold it.
- [Brad] And hold it for, you know, five to six seconds.
- [Bob] Works out really well for this.
So, all right, Brad, that's it.
- Well, Bob, I really think this covers all the bases
for strengthening for balance.
- Yeah. You'll definitely see some improvement
if you put these to work.
- Right. So I wouldn't do them, you know,
not every day, probably.
- No.
- No. Probably three, four times a week.
And then get used to it.
If you want to increase after that, you know,
use your judgment.
But Bob, once again-
- I'm going to be using this.
- Oh, be careful with that.
See there safe. Your kids won't be able to do-
- Oh yeah. You got some snap out of it.
- So much for that. Good luck with that.
- All right. Thanks for watching.