Pohltherapy

Pohltherapy®

Pohltherapie®

What is Pohltherapy®?

Pohltherapy, formerly known as Sensory-Motor Body Therapy according to Dr. Pohl, is a medication-free, body therapeutic method for treating unexplained physical discomforts and chronic pain, where often no organic medical findings could be established.

Pohltherapy consists of five treatment components that complement and enhance each other’s effects. The treatment is tailored individually to each patient and their problems after a comprehensive, holistic initial assessment with an analysis of the existing tension patterns.

The goal of Pohltherapy is to restore pain-free movement, natural mobility, and a good sense of body awareness. In active collaboration with the patient, underlying chronic tensions and adhesions in muscles, connective tissue, and fascia can be sustainably resolved.

Lasting success can be achieved through the analysis of the patient’s medical history and daily life, along with individually adapted exercises and body awareness training.

The Five Methods of Pohltherapy

1) Trigger Point Treatment/Release of Trigger Points

Through manual treatment, palpable, painful hardening (myogeloses/trigger points) in the muscles can be resolved. This allows the musculature to be freed from chronic contractions and cramps, improves blood circulation, and restores mobility.

2) Connective Tissue Treatment/Fascia Treatment

The origin of many physical discomforts lies in adhesions in the connective tissue. Pain, restricted movement, and diffuse sensations such as burning, tingling, numbness, itching, feelings of weakness, instability in joints, etc., can be the result. Through treatment, the connective tissue can become warmer, softer, and more flexible again; lymphatic flow can improve, and the underlying muscle can move better and receive better blood circulation.

3) Pandiculations according to Thomas Hanna

Thomas Hanna was a student of Moshe Feldenkrais and further developed his method. By specifically tensing and slowly relaxing individual muscles with counter-pressure from the therapist, the range of motion of the muscle can be increased again.

4) Body Awareness Training

In a thorough assessment, body statics and movement patterns are analyzed and improved to counteract the recurrence of problems and achieve lasting success. This means that in individual, systematic, and holistic treatment, not only is the tense neck treated but also the forward-leaning posture that underlies the physical discomforts. Only in this way can sustainable relief from problems be achieved.

5) Somatic Exercises

Individually tailored exercises and self-treatment methods are taught and practiced so that they can be replicated at home. They complement body awareness training, promote mobility, and enhance awareness of one’s own body.”

Treating pain without medication?

Shoulder and neck pain, debilitating back issues, frequent headaches, hip problems, lack of energy, weather sensitivity, abnormal sensations… Such complaints are considered normal “after a certain age”. Unfortunately, the problems often worsen, and one is at a loss as to how to become pain-free again.

Short-term stress and strain pose no danger to our bodies. We adapt to the situation and can endure it without harm. However, when tension and stress affect us over a long period of time, our bodies have no chance to regenerate, leading to discomfort.

Sedentary occupations, lack of movement, poorly adjusted workstations, car seats, hours spent at a PC or, worse yet, on a laptop, tablet, or phone, poor posture, compensatory postures, ‘bad habits,’ injuries, surgeries, stress, anger, bullying, worries… often result in complaints such as pain, tension, abnormal sensations (burning, itching, numbness…), breathing problems, nervousness, depression, burnout, lack of energy, movement restrictions—often inexplicable complaints. Medical examinations often yield no findings.

In most patients, the problems stem from ‘incorrect’ sitting, standing, walking, grasping, and breathing. Everyone knows they should sit or stand up straight, but how do you do it correctly? One has lost the sense of their own body. This is called sensory motor amnesia. How often do we hear ‘chest out, stomach in’? For most people, being upright is associated with effort, yet when we are truly upright and aligned, we are supported by our bones or skeleton. Our bones are specifically designed for these often enormous loads and do not tire. Our bones actually need the load! Our muscles, connective tissues, and fascia on the other hand should be relaxed in an upright position, requiring only small stability movements. Their job is to move us, not to hold us in one position.”

Sensory Motor Amnesia

Chronically tense muscles can no longer be perceived by the brain and cannot be voluntarily relaxed. The American body therapist Thomas Hanna referred to this condition as ‘Sensory Motor Amnesia.’

A chronically tense muscle thus does not have its full range of motion, and it may sometimes barely be able to move at all. Surrounding muscles must compensate, but over time, they also become chronically tense and overloaded. The result is that pain, movement restrictions, and other issues continue to spread.

Sensation and movement influence each other; that is, one cannot move what one does not feel, and vice ver

"Only when you know what you are doing can you do what you want"

Feldenkrais

With the help of the 5 methods of Pohltherapy, sensory motor amnesias can be detected and treated, allowing chronically tense muscles and adhered connective tissue and fascia to be moved again.

Somatic exercises and an individually tailored body awareness training bring unconscious posture and movement patterns back into awareness.

Loosen Instead of Strengthening

Unfortunately, the belief that pain, poor posture, compensatory postures, movement restrictions, feelings of weakness, instabilities, etc., stem from weak muscles is still widespread.

In fact, the opposite is usually the case. This can be observed in small children who can effortlessly sit with straight legs and a straight back.

However, when the abdominal muscles shorten, for example, from sitting hunched over in front of a laptop, it becomes tiring to sit upright. The culprit is not the weak back, but the tense abdominal muscles.

The approach of Pohl therapy is to loosen the shortened abdominal muscles and the connective tissue above them, rather than training and strengthening the opposing, overloaded back muscles.”

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