DM Orthotics® are world-leading creators of medical rehabilitation and sports performance products and we are very excited to be working with DM Orthotics® here at Spriggs Chiropractic. DM Orthotics stands for Dynamic Movement Orthotics, which are custom made garments designed to worn under your everyday clothing. They provide support using elastomeric fabrics designed to add continuous elastic support to the joints of your body. They provide strategic reinforcements to specific areas of your body with biomechanical paneling aimed at correcting abnormal joint movements and body postures.
DM Orthotics® garments are designed to work in two main ways:
- Neurologically
- Biomechanically
Neurologically
Neurological pathways connecting the brain to the body can be disrupted by injury or damage to either the brain or the peripheral nerves. The peripheral nerves is the name given to the nerves when they leave the spine. Within the spine, they are part of your central nervous system, once they leave the central nervous system, they become part of your peripheral nervous system.
When damage occurs to the brain or to the nerves that innervate the muscles of the arm for example, the damage can result in the patient finding it difficult to use the arm or hand effectively. There can be tremors, weakness (loss of muscle tone), or continued contraction (increased muscle tone) of some muscles of the arm and hand, making it very difficult for the patient to move correctly if at all. Say for example, that the muscles that flex your wrist were in a continuous cycle of involuntary contraction. This can occur as result of damage or injury to the central nervous system (the brain or spinal cord). This would result in it becoming very difficult for you to use your hand because it may be stuck in a permanently flexed position. DM Orthotics® are designed to increase the tone of the muscles that act in the opposing way of the muscles in continued contraction, by increasing the tone of the muscles that extend the wrist. This can aid in restoring feedback from the wrist and hand to the brain and aid in you extending your wrist back the other way. This, along with your rehabilitation exercises, aids in improved recovery from the injury and improved quality of life. Below you can see an example of the glove garments DMO is capable of manufacturing to aid in arm function, which have also been used by DMO to improve arm/hans function in patients with hand tremors, such as in cases of Parkinson’s Disease.
DM Orthotics have been designed to aid patients with a range of neuromuscular conditions including:
- Cerebral Palsy
- Stroke
- Multiple Sclerosis
- Neuropathic and idiopathic Scoliosis
- Rett Syndrome
- Parkinson’s Disease
- Huntingdon’s Chorea
Biomechanically
When a person is struggling with the function of say their wrist. As described already, if the wrist is in permanent flexion, it becomes very difficult to move correctly and extend the wrist the opposite way. DM Orthotics® also aid in the correction of this by providing a firm but gentle, continuous elastic pull on the back of the wrist, bringing it back into normal alignment. This is tied in with the neurological pathways discussed above through proprioceptive feedback or how the joints of your body tell your brain where they are and what they are going. By applying a continuous elastic pull onto the affected joint, the nerves of that joint continuously tell the brain to relax the contracted muscles and gently contract the opposite muscles, thus aiding in joint realignment.
Another way DM Othorics® garments can help is with joint hypermobility syndromes, such as Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) for example. Patients with EDS have extremely mobile joints that are prone to dislocation, joint instability, and subluxation (partial dislocation). DMO manufactures prefabricated joint stabilising garments to help support unstable or hypermobile joints, such as the shoulder support below. Or these garments can be custom made for your specific needs.
Postural Correcting Garments
As we have discussed in our previous blog posts “Posture in Health and Disease“ and “Wolff’s Law“ postural distortions and displacements can have a huge impact on conditions such as low back pain, sciatica and on overall spinal health. Postural rehabilitation is a big part of what Spriggs Chiropractic and Chiropractic Biophysics® are all about. DMO manufactures custom body orthoses to provide core stability, biomechanical realignment, dynamic balance along with improved muscle tone and function to improve your posture. These garments are manufactured to aid patients with complex neurological conditions that may result in poor posture, such as spinal muscular dystrophy and cerebral palsy using the DMO Suit. They are also manufactured to aid postural correction for patients with postural and structural scoliosis. Scoliosis is a huge topic and a fascinating condition so there will be a separate blog in June for this as June is Scoliosis Awareness Month. We will be teaming up with DMO® for joint publications on scoliosis ion June to keep an eye out!
We are very happy, proud and excited to have teamed up with DMO so we can help more patients achieve their health goals and improve their quality of life. For more information about the range of DM Orthotics® products and how they work, please go to our services page, go to their website, or watch this DM Orthotics video.