M.A.T.S therapy anyone ?

Anyone tried this stuff out ?

What is it?

??/ Muscular Activation Therapy System ??

MAT is a form of therapy that focuses on the "neuro" component of the neuromuscular system. One common problem w/ muscles following some kind of injury is that while you're healing up you tend not to use the injured part.
So you essentially learn new motor patterns while healing from even a moderate injury. This leads to biomechanical adaptations which can cause other problems down the road. MAT, Feldenkrais, and even good old fashioned weight training under the watchful eye of a therapist who knows what to look for are all ways of getting the brain back on track to begin using an area that it may have learned to get along w/out.
So it can be quite effective depending on what the goal is.

Hope that helped,
BA

john strand wrote:Anyone tried this stuff out ?

Not personally, but it did wonders for my wife's shoulder. Went from limited to motion to complete overhead in 2 months.

TS

Thanks- i am looking mostly to try and correct some long term arthritis crap and re- align after a hip replacement.

The M.A.T. won't do much for the joint damage you've already developed (you might try something along the lines of glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate).
However, the MAT may be just the thing to help you re-engage the hip stabilizers that may have taken a vacation following the replacement. That in turn will help the mechanics of the joint motion itself which may alleviate some of the arthritic pain.
Good luck resolving the hitch in your gittalong,
BA
Out of curiosity, was that a partial or total hip? If you don't mind sharing.

Total hip. I waited WAY to long but it came out ok. The hip itself is great, it's just getting re aligned after favoring it for some 15 years. Of course the knees and ankles went along for the ride as well. I got osteo and RA, bone chips, arthro, the whole deal after beating my self up for along time

So, I think you're talking about MAT (not MATS) therapy--Muscle Activation Techique therapy, right?

I actually took an introductory course in basic lower body MAT from the guy who invented it (Greg Roskopf) about 7 years ago.

Now, I am not certified nor have I ever done much actual hands-on application of it (mostly because I really needed more than two days of training and some DVDs to get proficient). I had thought about doing his cert series at the time, but it's really expensive and I would have had to fly to Denver every 4-6 weeks for several months for the training....I just couldn't swing it $$-wise or timewise.

Anyway, I was impressed with Greg--he works with a lot of top-notch athletes and teams. His before-and-after MAT videos of actual clients/patients was very impressive too.

MAT therapy is essentially useful for detecting ingrained biomechanical compensations and correcting them by re-educating the nervous system to fire muscle groups properly (and thus inhibit those which should not be activating). [This is what brentapgar also stated.]

Roskopf noted to us that MAT often finds and treats the biomechanical compensation in areas that traditional biomechanical assessment does not/cannot--i.e. other methods of assessment do not find and "see" the compensation in the areas he detects using MAT. (Okay, to be honest, I don't remember his exact words as it was 7 years ago, but it was something to that effect.)

Damn, it would be great to have Greg figure out why I cannot get the biomechanics of my left leg and foot to work like the right.... i.e. that means I think it works and you should try it!