Physical Therapy Services
Postural Training
Retraining the positions your body spends the most hours in.
Postural Training
Long hours at a desk, in a car, or over a phone load some structures and leave others idle, and that pattern often shows up as neck, shoulder or low back symptoms. Postural training addresses how you sit, stand and move through the day, alongside the hands-on treatment. Your therapist assesses your working positions and gives you specific changes and exercises to carry into them.
How It Works
How postural training is done here
Your therapist looks at the positions you actually spend the day in — at a desk, in a car, over a phone, or in the positions your work requires — and at how you move in and out of them. The point is not a single correct posture but the load that a repeated position places on particular structures.
From there you are given specific changes to the setup and to how you move, alongside exercise for the muscles the assessment finds are not doing their share. It runs alongside hands-on treatment rather than replacing it.
What It Addresses
What postural training is used for
Postural training is used here to address presentations like these. Whether it is part of your plan is decided at your evaluation.
- Neck, shoulder or low back symptoms associated with long hours in one position
- Desk and workstation positions identified on assessment as loading a symptomatic area
- Movement habits that keep aggravating a problem being treated
- Maintaining the change made by hands-on treatment between visits
What to Expect
One-on-one care, built around you
Your care begins with a one-on-one evaluation. Rather than focusing on the symptoms alone, we establish a cause and effect relationship through accurate palpation and assessment of the body, then build a rehabilitation program customized to your individual needs.
- Questions about your working day and the positions it involves, and an assessment of how you hold and move through them.
- Specific, practical adjustments rather than a general instruction to sit up straight.
- Exercise aimed at what the assessment found, to be continued at home.
- Review at follow-up visits, with adjustments as your symptoms change.
Common Questions
Questions we are asked about Postural Training
- Is this just being told to sit up straight?
- No. The assessment looks at the positions you are actually in and what they load, and the changes are specific to that. A single fixed posture held all day is its own problem.
- Do I need to bring anything?
- It helps to be able to describe your desk or workstation setup, and photographs of it on your phone are useful if you have them.
- Will this fix my pain on its own?
- It is one component of a plan rather than a treatment on its own. What it addresses is the load a repeated position places on the area being treated.
- Do I need a referral, and is it covered?
- We accept major insurance providers, but coverage for postural training varies by plan, and some plans ask for a physician's referral or prescription while others do not. Call (212) 922-0044 before your first visit and we will confirm your coverage and tell you what, if anything, you need to bring.