Hello, welcome to the Balance Body podcast. I'm Lindy Royer. I'm a physical therapist,
founder of Piedmontos Pilates and Physical Therapy in Lowentree, Colorado, and a Balance
Body faculty member. I'm here with my friend Mary, who's going to show us how scapula mobility
exercises can help increase shoulder range of motion. Mary's on a ball, this is a 55
centimeter fit ball, and we're using today the push-through bar on the trapeze table
to help her facilitate some scapula mobility. Scapula mobility is particularly important
when it comes to accessing shoulder girdle range of motion, and as we mature our shoulders
tend to get more stiff. A lot of times it's the scapula that is part of the problem rather
than just the shoulder joint. The scapula mobility becomes more of a component of attaining
more movement along with thoracic mobility. So rather than focusing just on the glenohumeral
joint, we need to be spending more time looking at scapula mobility, function, and biomechanics,
and also on thoracic mobility and less time just trying to get glenohumeral range of motion.
So we're going to do just the right arm, and then we're going to do a bilateral exercise
with Mary. Are you ready? Okay, so I'm going to bring the bar down just to remind us it's
important to make sure that when using the push-through bar on the trapeze table that
we communicate with each other about safety. So Mary, this bar is spring loaded, and you
are going to be responsible once I take my hand off for controlling this bar. Usually
what happens if we have some kind of an accident with the push-through bar is the client is
usually just fine because they're out of the way. We are the ones that tend to get injured
if anything happens. So we need to protect not only our clients but also ourselves making
sure that we have good safety and good communication with each other. So Mary, you're going to
push this bar forward keeping your arms straight by moving your shoulder blade forward around
your rib cage. So Mary is protracting her scapula, and at the same time that's facilitating
some spine rotation to the left. And then Mary, can you bring your shoulder blade back
towards your spine? So as she starts to retract the scapula, that's facilitating some rotation
back to the right. And did that feel okay for you? All right. So Mary does not have osteoporosis,
so this is a fine movement for her to do. And I also happen to know that Mary is a golfer.
So golfing is something that she loves to do. And rotation is a component of golf. So this
is a great functional exercise for her. Keep in mind that with our osteoporotic clients,
we don't want to be doing seated rotation. So this is contraindicated for our osteoporotic
clients. So now that Mary's got that, I can let go of my hand and we can focus a little
bit more on scapula mobility. So I'm just cueing her to help her find that retracted
position. Now see if you can do that with the elbow straight and see if you can just
bring that shoulder blade a little closer, keeping the elbow length. And there we go,
beautiful. And then one more time, going that way. Notice that we get a little bit of rotation.
And then shoulder blade is going to come back toward the spine, keeping the elbow long.
Very nice, thank you. And then, Mary, can you put your left hand on the bar? So now
we're going to take this exercise into elevation. And we're going to be looking for scapula
upward rotation. That is the inferior angle of the scapula moving more toward the mid-exhilarity
line on the rib cage. This is a component of shoulder elevation. So we're going to do
this with both hands, Mary, if you can put both hands on the bar. So this exercise starts
with both arms lengthened. Mary's doing a fabulous job of sitting in alignment on the
ball. This is something that tends to help facilitate a little bit of core control. But
if you have clients or students who are not able to maintain stability, this is perfectly
okay to do on a stool. Okay, so Mary, first thing you're going to do is you're going to
allow your shoulders to just be a little wider, beautiful. And she's anchored into the ball.
You're going to bend the elbows. So for this first repetition, I'm helping guide the bar
and helping to guide Mary so that we get the movement that we want. And then allow the
shoulder blades to shrug up. And then can you allow them then to shrug down as you start
to bring the bar down, bending the elbows. Now maintain that position as you push the
bar through. Is that okay? So I'm going to let go of the bar. You're in charge. And what
we're going to take a look at here is as she bends her elbows and the hands start to go
up above her shoulders, I'm just helping facilitate a little bit of scapula upward rotation.
And then as you bring the bar down, we're bringing that shoulder blade back, the bottom
of the shoulder blades coming toward the spine. Good. And she's keeping nice lift through
the front of the chest here. Two more times, if you will. So as the bar goes up, we're
looking for that inferior angle to come forward around the ribs and then down and back. Good.
And we're going to finish with one more. And I'm just going to remind both shoulder blades
of that. So as you bring the bar up, visualize those shoulder blades, tips of shoulder blades
sliding forward. Now shrug the shoulders all the way up. So we want to also feel the
contrast as you exhale, slide them down and bring the bar through. Nicely done. And I
have the bar. Excellent. Thank you very much. And thank you for watching.
