To complement the MASSAGE Magazine article, "The MyoKinesthetic System: Elevate Your Results to Generate Repeat Business," by Michael Uriarte, D.C., in the September 2010 issue. Article summary: People who study the MyoKinesthetic System haven't learned anything like it before, because what makes this technique unique is not in how you stimulate the muscles. (You can put a stimulation into a muscle any way you want.) The true power of this technique is the combination of muscles you work on in the session. The key is to stimulate all the muscles along one nerve pathway.

by Michael Uriarte, D.C.

The MyoKinesthetic System for massage therapists is a value-add, not a replacement. It is better as a stand-alone treatment. Do it first, and then do the massage.

Start by telling the client, “If this massage doesn’t make you feel better, or if you feel better but the problem returns later this week, come back. I have another treatment call the MyoKinesthetic System that could work for you.” And you can let them know:

• There are no lubricants involved

• They don’t get undressed

• It works to get rid of his or her specific complaint

• It takes 15 minutes or less

• And this is what you charge for this specific treatment

I have found giving this information to clients up front allows them to make more intelligent decisions about their own health.

After you do the treatment, stand your client up; the treatment isn’t complete until the person stands up. This allows the brain to make the appropriate compensations to the information we just put into the body. Then do a

regular massage.

Also, this technique will change the client's posture. By doing a massage afterward, you’ll relax the muscles to the new posture, so the client stays balanced even longer.

“Before coming to me,” says Bob Keller of Keller Therapeutics, “most of my clients have visited physicians, chiropractors, orthopedists, physical therapists and others, without relief from their symptoms. I’d like to be a bit higher up the food chain, but being the treatment of last resort is OK because it almost always works where others have failed.”

How to become certified

In order to become certified, you first have to take both upper- and the lower-body classes. After those two classes, you will have the ability to perform postural assessments to see where in the nervous system a client is having a problem and, if necessary, the confidence to perform muscle testing.

The information that will separate certified practitioners apart is a higher level of proficiency and the knowledge of how to address the organs through the soft tissue. In the certification class, I teach how to go after the other problems besides the normal unbalanced posture, limited range of motion and pain. I teach you how to speed up or slow down information to have an impact on different organs.

Michael Uriarte, D.C., is the founder and developer of the MyoKinesthetic system. For more than 18 years he has been doing research on the nervous system and soft-tissue therapy. He teaches nationwide and is the only instructor of this technique. More information can be found at his website, www.myokinesthetic.com.

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