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Total Gym—Benefits to the Therapist

Therapists can build injury specific protocols for any type of patient.
 
  • Total Gym allows therapists to create unlimited, movement specific applications within a completely functional modality.
  • Treatment protocols are unlimited - able to reflect the clinicians experience, knowledge and imagination.
  • Over 200 functional exercises, discovered mostly by therapists, are documented and available on video.
  • The DVD series, Functional Applications for Rehab and Work Reconditioning, Vol 1-3, feature protocols for three areas of concern: Lower Extremity, Upper Extremity and Back/Trunk.
 
Body weight against gravity resistance, in combination with Total Gym's dynamic pulley system and free-rolling glideboard, allows for unrestricted range of motion in any plane of movement or in multi-planes on nearly every exercise.
 
  • Because the patient is the load, and there is no external weight, patients function on Total Gym just as they do in life, moving their bodies against the natural force of gravity, restricted only by the patient's ability and determination.
  • There is no restricted range of movement locked into Total Gym's functionality as there is with many single station machines.
  • Total Gym's dynamic pulley system allows for a free range of movement utilizing unilateral, bilateral or cyclocentric movements—which initiate a cycle of continuous eccentric and concentric load simultaneously.
  • The patient is the load, and as such can be placed in any number of positions on the glideboard allowing movement through all three planes of motion-frontal, sagittal and transverse. This increases the functional dynamic and outcome of each exercise.
  • With external weights or isolation machines, this is not possible.
 
Total Gym is easy for the Therapist to use:
 
  • The motorized PowerTower allows the clinician to raise or lower the resistance during an exercise in progress, without getting the patient off the Total Gym.
  • Additionally, the clinician can raise the level for the patient to get on and then lower it to the desired resistance level for the exercise, without any physical effort extended by the clinician.
 
Patients can begin unloaded, closed-chain exercise very soon after surgery. Progressive levels of calibrated resistance allow for incremental progression.
 
  • Total Gym allows a patient to begin partial weight bearing activity, in a functional closed-chain environment, beginning with as little as 6 percent of body weight.
  • Our specially engineered Closed Chain Platform (CCP) allows for 90-degree squats. It comes with a Toe Stand for ankle and calf strengthening.
  • The Closed Chain Platform (CCP) accepts the BAPS on an interchangeable U-joint for unloaded BAPS training. You can also attach a Wobble Board to the CCP for increasing balance and proprioception.
  • The clinical model Total Gym units can begin with as little as 3% body weight and move up to 72%. Each model comes with a
  • Calibration Chart that allows you to calculate the exact percentage of body weight each patient is bearing.
  • Some Total Gym models allow the Therapist to raise the base of the incline to assist patients who may need a higher training surface to begin.
 
Total Gym enhances proprioception throughout its repertoire of exercises.
  • Whether for rebuilding neuromuscular response in a stroke patient or for enhancing athletic performance, Total Gym fosters proprioceptive training naturally.
  • Since the rolling glideboard provides an unstable platform for the body, Total Gym recruits muscles automatically from the core, as well as the intrinsic proprioceptors surrounding the major muscle groups and joints, to enhance stabilization, balance and coordination.
 
Therapists enjoy a high degree of patient acceptance.
  • Patients love Total Gym. It is easy to use and it is fun. That is why nearly 40 percent of our customers are post-rehab patients who discovered the conditioning benefits of Total Gym in a clinical environment.
 
Therapists can track progress with Total Gym's calibration tools.
  • Total Gym 26000 commercial model comes with a Trochanter Locator Grid and optional accessories are available to measure the slide distance of the board (Slide Distance Scale) or to limit the range of motion of the board (Slide Distance Regulator).
  • These items act as tools for measuring range of motion and assist clinicians in gathering the information to measure specific outcomes.
  • Studies verify that Total Gym can be used to track actual functional ability levels.

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