Ep 30: Gift Of Injury: The Strength Athlete’s Guide To Recovering From Back Injury With Dr Stuart McGill

Dr. Stuart McGill is the man who restores very difficult backs. He is a professor emeritus, University of Waterloo, where he was a professor for 32 years. He conducted laboratory and experimental research into the causal mechanisms that cause back pain. His work has resulted in books, products, courses, over 240 peer-reviewed scientific journal papers, textbooks, and the answers to fixing back problems and pain. He has mentored graduate students and taught thousands of clinicians and practitioners.He is the Chief Scientific Officer for Backfitpro Inc. where all products offered have been tested in his laboratory. He has helped elite athletes and everyone in between. His website is full of testimonials from people he has helped including actor Ed O’Neill from Modern Family, and father of Kettlebell workouts Pavel Tsatsouline. He is here today to talk about his new book Gift of Injury: The strength athlete’s guide to recovering from back injury to winning again which he co-authored with powerlifter Brian Carroll.Today’s topics include: McGill shares his love of researching and understanding everything about the spine and rehabilitating it. He focuses on the very difficult cases and in helping elite athletes. His whole history has been driven by sport and performance. McGill loves the application of fitness and strength and working with elite athletes and understanding how to tune their bodies a little more to unleash their athleticism and unload the history of back pain. The challenge of helping MMA fighters with not locking up their bodies when heading into the fight. They need to control the fear and unleash their bodies. Their is a full spectrum of challenges with optimum athleticism for competitive fighters and martial artists. How typical medical practice doesn’t access pain. The story of Brian Carroll’s injury and how having pain was compromising his entire life. In Gift of Injury they tell the story of how Dr. McGill helped Brian Carroll come back from his injury and begin winning again. Moving in ways that don’t respect the injury and the pain mechanism. The examination begins with an interview in Dr. McGill’s house where his laboratory is now. He pays attention because he has to coach these people through movement patterns. It’s an exercise in pattern recognition. It’s about understanding the mechanism of pain and then doing the opposite to take the pain away. Nothing can be interpreted without examining the person at the start. Brian Carroll’s injuries were more extensive than he thought. They followed Dr. McGill’s plan to get Brian out of pain. Athletic training and getting out of pain can’t be mixed. Then they made a plan to make Brian’s body so robust he was able to lift and compete again. The technique of pain provocation. How there is no such pain as back pain. There is something that determines the mechanism of the back pain. Nonspecific back pain doesn’t exist. Find the pain mechanism and the differential diagnosis. Get through the list and systematically probe the pain and find reactions to different things and find what causes pain. How the role ofShow Your Support: Rate and Review Us!If you enjoyed today's episode, please consider giving us a 5-star rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. Your support helps us reach more people and bring you even more quality content. Click the link below to rate and review us now! Rate and Review us on Apple Podcasts FREE DownloadsTo learn more about Strength Matters and our high-performance training system, download your FREE copy of The Strength Matters System of Athletic Development. Get it at - www.strengthmatters.com/system