Erik Dalton Bio
Origin of the Myoskeletal Alignment Techniques®

Executive Director of the Freedom From Pain Institute® Clinical psychology/philosophy degrees from the University of Oklahoma Graduate of: Mueller College of Holistic Studies Menninger Foundation American Institute of Hypnotherapy Rolf® Institute of Structural Integration Certified Advanced Rolfing Training

For more information about his groundbreaking approach to holistic “hands-on healing”, call 1-800-709-5054 for a free brochure or browse the Institute’s web site.

 

Economic researchers agree that the manual therapy field is the fastest growing of all service industries. Touch therapies, such as oriental bodywork, neuromuscular, structural integration, and assisted stretching, are becoming the holistic protocol for the aches and pains so affluent in all walks of life. Why? The answer is simple... they work!

Current studies show the surprising benefits of bodywork in persons suffering chronic back pain. Insurance companies and federal programs are suddenly willing to reimburse for hands-on clinical therapies that demonstrate cost-effectiveness due to a quality of life outcome. Even the Federal Government is offering student and school grants in hopes that thriving vocational programs will stimulate a sagging economy. This has resulted in an upsurge of new bodywork massage schools popping up at an amazing rate because of reinvested federal and state Vo-tech grants.

Some professional level manual therapists voice concern that third-party pay from insurance companies, schools that work "the system", and new students entering the marvelous world of touch therapy may be drawn to the profession for the wrong reasons. Some fear the work may gradually become watered-down, institutionalized and creatively deficient. The journey has only begun.

 

Pain Management Therapies One piece of the manual therapy pie that seems to be attracting the most attention today is management of chronic pain. Professional therapists find the art of helping people who hurt to be extremely self-gratifying, intellectually stimulating and potentially lucrative.

Economists and medical researchers alike are struck by the sudden rise in the popularity of touch therapies. But for many hard-working massage therapists who, for years, have been grinding it out in the trenches, constantly searching for new, more reliable ways to conquer pain problems triggered by an over-stimulated, flexion-­addicted society, the future looks bright as the information highway flows freely via internet, books, and videos.

Some economists have remarked that pain management may be recession-proof. It is obvious for those of us in the profession. WHY? Because of the natural laws of society… people search high and low to find that special therapist who can help them break their chronic pain cycle. Sadly, therapists may harbor feelings of frustration and inadequacy in the absence of the proper therapeutic tools to help their hurting clients.

Think about it, how many of us have received adequate hands-on training that would enable us to understand and treat chronic conditions such as head pain, neck cricks, rotator cuff tears, carpal tunnel, scoliosis, lumbago, sciatica, and visceral problems? Yet these conditions prevail throughout our bodywork practices. But the world, she is a changin'! Today we are blessed with many fine teachers, learning institutions and associations totally committed to raising the level of expertise in our manual therapy community. With the introduction of new therapeutic approaches that help decrease pain, increase flexibility and improve posture, enthusiasm is spreading throughout our manual therapy community.
 

Learn breakthrough therapeutic approaches!

Treat chronic soft tissue pain with Dalton's Myoskeletal Alignment Techniques® 

 

Tension, Trauma, Poor Posture The primary attribute responsible for breaking pain/ spasm/ pain cycles lies in the therapeutic blending of muscle balancing routines with unique joint-capsule maneuvers. One of Dalton's major contributions to the somatic therapy field is his emphasis on treating stubborn pain conditions by mobilizing joints through muscle manipulation. The body's myofascial and skeletal systems are inseparable. What affects one always affects the other.

Today's bodywork professional competing in a rapidly evolving therapeutic marketplace should learn:
 

• How to assess and correct muscle imbalance patterns using Dr. Vladimir Janda's "Upper and Lower Crossed Syndromes"

• How to safely integrate Golgi tendon, ligament friction, facet recoil, assisted stretching, and spindle techniques for holistic pain-relief

• How to correct forward head postures, Dowager's Humps, SI Pain, scoliosis

• How distorted postures develop from third-trimester fetal development

• How dural-drag at the occiput, C2 and coccyx causes head, neck and hip pain

• How to break neurological pain cycles with special Myoskeletal Receptor Techniques

• How to integrate practice-building joint-capsule-releases (JCR)

• How to evolve your clients to a new state of health... the Myoskeletal way!
   

Buy all Dalton products in one package at a reduced price The Complete Collection Buy all Dalton products in one Complete set includes basic and advanced certification and 48 education CE hours. Volumes 1-2-3-4 DVDs and Manuals. Only $743 with 48 CEs/ $683.95 without CEs Saves over $239 off the price of buying everything individually!

Therapists also learn six dynamic ways to identify and correct conditions such as sciatica, lumbago, scoliosis, Dowager's Humps, rib dysfunction, carpal tunnel, rotator cuff injuries, forward head postures, and anterior scalene syndrome.

1—evaluate painful neck, shoulder, arm, and low back structures looking for ART = Asymmetry, Restriction of motion and Tissue texture abnormality

2—lengthen only the hypertonic (tight) muscles

3—tonify weak, inhibited muscle groups to promote agonist/antagonist balance

4—palpate and dig-out fibrosis in deep spinal rotator muscles that lock facet joints open or closed

5—improve scoliotic postures by releasing cervicocranial, cervicothoracic, transabdominal, and pelvic diaphragms

6—correct adhesions, sympathetic spasm, and joint blockage caused by Tension, Trauma and Poor Posture
 

The Myoskeletal method simplifies assessment of painful neck, low back, shoulder, arm, and hand conditions by looking for A.R.T. = Asymmetry, Restriction of motion, and Tissue texture abnormality. Treating pain without improving posture is generally regarded as a quick-fix and, at best, only a temporary solution for helping our clients in need. Fortunately, the work of the great biomechanical researcher Vladimir Janda, M.D., has gifted the bodywork field with two very powerful tools for identifying muscle­ imbalance strain patterns that cause body asymmetry leading to pain.

 

Dalton's books and videos dramatically detail these two very basic and powerful strain patterns called "upper and lower crossed syndromes." Familiarity with this list of tight and weak muscles allows the therapist to go directly to the source of the postural problem, test for A.R.T. and correct the dysfunction.

It is no surprise that researchers find Janda's dysfunctional upper and lower crossed postural patterns in approximately 75 percent of all clients reporting chronic neck, back, scapular, and hip pain. Since 1998, Dalton's "Dirty-Dozen" Myoskeletal Technique formula has proven amazingly successful in correcting these painful agonist-antagonist muscle imbalance patterns.

The five-minute assessment routines are intentionally streamlined allowing them to be performed on the table in a typical bodywork format. Clients complaining of chronic neck, head, low back, shoulder, and hand pain may then be "fixed" with Dalton's "Dirty-­Dozen" techniques.

 

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