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THIS ISSUE:
Sports
Massage
Swedish Institute on-line newsletter for our students, faculty and community.
Congratulations to our triathlon team!
The Swedish Institute's first athletic team competed in the Nautica NYC Triathlon on Sunday, July 16, 2006, with five of its six members joining 3,200 other athletes for this exciting event.
Members of the team who raced consisted of team captain Karin Linner, a third- semester Massage Therapy student, Maggie Brinley, a first-semester Massage Therapy student, Massage Therapy faculty members Jenn Sommermann and Charles Pegg, and alumnus Kevin Oriole ('05). The sixth member Massage Therapy alumnus ('02) Susan Stanley was preparing for the 2006 Ironman Lake Placid.
(Photographed above are, from the left, Kevin, Jenn, Charles and Karin.)
Race course and results
On Sunday, the starter's gun went off just before 6 a.m. to signal the beginning of the first leg of the race, a 1500-meter swim in the Hudson River. Athletes entered the water at 98th Street and the Hudson River. They swam south through trees floating in the river to the 79th Street Boat Basin and from there picked up their bikes. They undertook a 40-kilometer race up the Henry Hudson Highway into the Bronx and then into the park before returning to 79th Street. Then they changed into sneakers and were off again, finishing a 10-kilometer run just west of the park bandshell on 72nd Street. (For details see the Course.)
The team was proud of captain Karin Linner, who placed first in the elite female runners' group (2:09:58), qualifying her for the Lifetime Fitness National Championships. Charles, in the men's elite group, placed 11th (2:06:38), after winning a tough last-minute sprint to the finish. Jenn placed in the top 20 of her age group. Maggie and Kevin both finished close to the 3-hour mark, great attempts for their first Olympic distance triathlon. All of the runners wore hi-tech chips that monitored their distance and time and gave them an immediate digital ranking according to their age group.
After the race, the team members joined hundreds of fellow participants at the Swedish Institute tent where students provided free sports massage sessions. (See Student Offsites for details.)
The following week, on July 23, Susan Stanley ran the 2006 Ironman Lake Placid, finishing her first Ironman distance race in an amazing
11:19:50, which placed her seventh in her age group of 35 to 39.
Team Background
The team members' experience in racing is impressive. Karin won her age group in the prestigious Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon and last year's NYC race. Maggie has run the NYC Marathon, but never a triathlon. Jenn ran in the Danskin Triathlon in Seattle in 2005 and placed 128th out of 3,597 women. Charles is a member of the Hudson Valley Triathlon Club and placed in the top ten overall at the 2005 NYC Triathlon. Kevin, a personal trainer, uses the discipline of triathlon as part of his training regimen and has competed in many local races.
Sports Massage at the Triathlon
The first group of supervisors showed up at 7 a.m. on Sunday, July 16 to get ready for one of the busiest student Offsite Internships in the Massage Therapy Program. Of the more than 3,000 participants in the Nautica NYC Triathlon, how many might appreciate a brief massage to their aching legs, feet or arms? Offsite director Charles Pegg had arranged for 100 student therapists to work there in shifts from 8 a.m. until 2 p.m. to try to accommodate as many athletes as possible.
The first wave started arriving at the massage tent around 8 a.m., after completing the course (see Course for details.) It wasn't long before all 30 tables held tired bodies, with students applying sports massage techniques they had learned in preparation. Faculty member Geoff Dawe, supervising the offsite for the day, said, "We focus on techniques that sedate muscles and speed recovery, which means lots of passive stretching, range of motion exercises, some effleurage and compression. Since the muscles are already over-stimulated, we avoid deep or focused pressure in any area of the body."
As more participants finished, the mix of athletes, friends, fans, vendors and pets made
the area exuberantly energetic. The atmosphere under the tent became bodies-in-motion backed by the
sounds of a steel band playing nearby. A line for massage started to form. One racer asked, "Is this the
queue for a massage?" Geoff Dawe replied affirmatively. When the athlete asked, "How deep is it?" Geoff
countered, "The massage or the wait?" When told the wait, Geoff replied, "We'll have you on a table in
five minutes." He wrote down the name and then called it out a few minutes later, pointing to the therapist
who was available.
Students worked valiantly to keep up with the demand, often foregoing breaks and staying on past their required three-hour shift to help out. As one grateful athlete got up from the table, he thanked his therapist and wished her well with her next "hundreds of clients." Though he was joking, he had a sense of the big picture; Geoff Dawe directed over 500 athletes to massage tables that day.
Students often approach Offsites with apprehension, lacking confidence in skills and uncertain about working in a new style and different environment. But Offsite experience usually changes that, allowing students to gain confidence by seeing the benefits of their work and expanding their sense of what might be possible. Two students who had been nervous about this event said they enjoyed it so much they would pursue sports massage as a specialty after graduation.
The Offsite Internships
The mission of the Offsite Internships is two-fold; to provide students with an opportunity to meet a wide variety of clients, apply techniques they are learning in class and find inspiration for future practice, while at the same time serving the community by making massage therapy available to diverse populations, many of them underserved. Offsites are usually one-time events where students work for several hours in small groups under an instructor's supervision. Students participate in three Offsites: relaxing chair massage, sports massage at an athletic event and finally therapeutic massage at a medical facility. For a complete list of Offsites see Events.
See MORE PHOTOS of this event.
Charles Pegg, L.M.T.
Faculty, Massage Therapy Program
Creating a new SISTEM
During his early twenties Charles Pegg was a professional athlete, playing cricket for an Australian team and at the top of his form. While surfing one day, however, a wave grabbed him and threw him heels over head into the shallows. "I was put into a quick extension," Charles explained, "and instinctively twisted to the right to get out of it. I heard something click and thought I'd knocked a vertebrae out of place." What actually happened, though he didn't realize it until four painful months later, was that he had broken his back. The right transverse process of a lumbar vertebrae had fractured.
He had managed the pain with stretching, focused exercise and gentle massage therapy. Though the fracture had healed, the realization of what had happened was a pivotal point in Charles' life. "It knocked the competitive edge out of me," he said. "And I realized I had to begin a period of self-awareness and self care." He took up yoga, started eating better, and made massage an important part of his life. His dedication to wellness led him to study massage therapy, which he did at the Swedish Institute. "After completing the program in 1997," Charles said, "I felt well enough to think about competing again. I started biking and running, and eventually got into training for the Triathlon."
Turning personal experience into vision
There's an expression that "a man with a small illness leads a long life." For Charles, the approach to care that worked for him is something he now wants to bring to others in a large scale way. He is creating a program at the school called SISTEM (Swedish Institute Sports Team and Event Massage.) "There is a great need at sporting events for massage therapy, but since most venues cannot afford to provide it, they have relied heavily on volunteer therapists," Charles said. "When that happens, there is little control over the massage protocol and no guarantee that therapists are experienced in sports massage. What we plan to do is have trained, supervised therapists who can properly evaluate, treat and refer athletes. They will have specific protocols which will consist of different sports massage techniques, depending on whether, for instance, an athlete is exhausted at the end of a grueling competition or has a cramp after a short event. A lot of people don't yet understand how different these approaches are, and I believe that is one of the reasons past research has been so inconclusive."
The list of first call therapists would be available to respond to the many requests for massage at special events and charitable fund raisers that come into the school. Though the offsite internship program does provide supervised student massage at a number of such venues (see Events for a complete list), SISTEM's scope would be professional and international, involving licensed therapists prepared to travel.
The larger goal, as expressed in SISTEM's mission statement, is to "provide a bridge between the concept of corporations and humanity through the utilization of massage therapy and event support" wherever it is needed. SISTEM managers are currently seeking corporate sponsors who will share the vision of providing meaningful care, researching results and contributing to a healthier world.
John N. Johnson ('37)
Caring for Jaspers and Giants
In 1936, when John N. Johnson graduated from high school in southern New Jersey, he thought about becoming
a doctor. However, the depression had a grip on the country, and there was no way he could afford medical
school. Then he heard about physical therapy, and saw it as an opportunity to be in the medical field
helping people, which was what he wanted. With financial help from a supervisor at his part-time job,
Mr. Johnson paid the $500 tuition for a year at the Swedish Institute of Physiotherapy in New York. He went
to live with an aunt in Brooklyn, and took the subway, which cost five cents, into Manhattan.
Today, nearly 70 years later, John "Doc" Johnson still works for the New York Giants as part of an athletic
training group he started over 50 years ago. Mr. Johnson also worked simultaneously as Manhattan College's
head athletic trainer for 56 years, a position he held until a much celebrated retirement. The skills he
learned as a student at the Swedish Institute gave him his start.
The 4th person from the left on the top row is Mr. Johnson.
In 1936, physiotherapy at the Swedish Institute focused not only on massage techniques, but also equally
on rehabilitative exercises led by Captain Theodore Melander, the school's founder. In addition, students
learned external applications like short wave diathermy, heat lamps and colonics. School hours were 9 a.m.
to 5 p.m., with classes in the morning and supervised work in a hospital in the afternoon.
Today Mr. Johnson looks back on his career with great fondness, a key to his longevity in the field.
"I loved the supervised internships at the hospital," he recalled. He was sent to the Jewish Hospital with
a group of students who were assigned to the physical therapy department. (It wasn't until years later that
physiotherapy split into two distinct professions of physical therapy and massage therapy; see
Milestones).
"I always approached massage as a focused, medical intervention. At that time, many of the patients we
treated at the hospital clinic were at the tail end of a polio epidemic. A clinic appointment cost 25 cents."
His first job out of school was in a YMCA as director of physical services. Three years later he was drafted
into World War II, where he served in the physical therapy department of the Air Force. After the service
he was working in the Navy as a civilian athletic trainer at a Naval base in Iowa, when a job opened for
head athletic trainer at Manhattan College in New York City.
Athletic trainer's focus
"When I first started out as a trainer, I was one of the few who'd had formal training of any kind.
Most of the time it was learned on the job," he said. As an athletic trainer, Mr. Johnson's work included
muscle stimulation, infra-red lamps, massage, taping and first aid. "As head trainer it was my job to get
the athletes ready, physically, to perform," he said. Like today's L.M.T., it was not in his scope of
practice to diagnose problems, so he always worked under the direction of a team doctor. When injuries did
occur, he administered rehabilitative exercises prescribed by the team physician.
"Even if an injury wasn't serious, I never told any of the athletes with an ache or a pain that 'it's
nothing.' I always put my hands on them, because that always made them feel better. I wanted to let them
know that someone was there to listen and to care." Mr. Johnson continued his education as a trainer after
graduating from the Swedish Institute, taking continuing education courses from professional organizations
such as the National Athletic Trainers Association (NATA). He maintains his licenses as a massage therapist
(NY) and a physical therapist (NJ).
While he was taking care of the Manhattan College athletes (referred to as the "Jaspers" after their first
trainer, Brother Jasper), Mr. Johnson also began to work for the New York Giants. He started as head trainer
in 1948. "I would work with the Giants in the morning," he said, "and then go to the college in the
afternoon. It was a long day, but I loved it. I'd often get on a plane and go wherever the team was playing
on weekends."
Gradually, care of the team become the responsibility of an elite group of sports and exercise science
professionals which Mr. Johnson has stayed part of. "Nowadays, athletic training is a very sophisticated
business," he said. "People are more educated, they know more about the body and have specialized techniques.
Starting out today a top trainer has to have at least a bachelor's degree, and maybe a master's or a
doctorate."
Reaping accolades
Although Mr. Johnson feigned resistance to revealing his age ("Will keep the ladies away" he joked)
there's no doubt that he has had a long and rewarding life. His philosophy for longevity is, "Watch your
diet, exercise and try to be a little happy in life. I think it's important to laugh at things as often
as you can, and love what you do."
His love for his work did not go unnoticed. He has been honored by the Giants with dinners, plaques, signed
footballs and portraits. Manhattan College awarded him the distinction of a Diploma of Benefactor from the
Brothers of Christian Schools, an honor that has to be approved by the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in
Rome. In addition, Mr. Johnson received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Metro Atlantic Athletic
Conference in 1997, and a similar award from the American College of Sports Medicine in 1998. The National
Invitational Tournament/Metropolitan Basketball Writers Association honored him with its Distinguished
Service Award in 2000. When he retired from Manhattan College, his colleague and former student Dr. Lisa
Toscano said to the hundreds of well-wishers, "Tonight is not an ordinary night, but 'Doc' is not an
ordinary man. The guests in the room span six decades of athletes, but the common denominator is that he
has taken care of all of them."
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Elusive consistency
A 2005 review of research in the UK showed that massage used in preparation for competition, between competitions and in assisting recovery from competition accounted for 45 percent of the total time athletes spend in physiotherapy
(1). Massage, used for centuries by athletes, is highly regarded as a way to increase blood flow, reduce muscle tension and neural excitability, and create a sense of well being, thereby improving athletic performance without drugs or side effects. However, the review found that studies seeking to prove such claims are either inconclusive, flawed in design, contradictory or inconsistent. The mechanisms through which massage effects such changes also remain unclear.
One question that the review neither looked for in studies nor mentioned as lacking seems crucial: who is providing the massage? Is it lay people or educated professionals? If massage is going to be an "active ingredient", then its "potency" should be considered. Education and experience will matter quite a bit in getting good results. It's one of the reasons the Swedish Institute is working to develop a professional massage team to go to sporting events (see
SISTEM).
Another basic issue in studies concerns comparison of techniques. In the introduction to one study on quadriceps performance after exercise fatigue
(2) the authors compared results of an earlier study on fatigue and recovery that used 20 minutes of pneumatic device massage to a study that used 5 minutes of vibratory massage.
Massage therapists are working for change, trying to help design studies as well as change current research paradigms (see
Research
Consortium). Sports massage is one of the specialties waiting for successful research to catch up to its successful use (see
Worth Pondering).
(1) Weerapong, P., Hume, P., Kolt, G. The Mechanisms of Massage and Effects on Performance, Muscle Recovery and Injury Prevention.
Sports Medicine 2005; 35 (3): 235-256
(2) Rinder, A.N., Sutherland, C.J. An investigation of the effects of massage on quadriceps performance after exercise fatigue.
Complementary Therapies in Nursing & Midwifery 1995;1: 99-102
Running ahead
Successful forms of treatment often run ahead of precise knowledge of the premises from which they arise.
R. Pemberton, "Physiology of massage" in Handbook of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, The Blakiston Company, 1950.
Your comments, suggestions and questions are welcome. Please e-mail me here at the Swedish Institute.
Barbara Goldschmidt, editor.