By Dr. Sean M. Wells, DPT, PT, OCS, ATC/L, CSCS, NSCA-CPT CNPT, Cert-DN

Physical therapists (PTs) are stepping up their game and focusing on important in the clients' lives: social determinants of health (SDOH), wellness, alcohol and drug use, sleep, and nutrition. As we venture into a newer world of PT practice, clinicians need to be armed with useful tools and resources to help them along the way. Let's outline some of our team's favorite nutrition apps that have helped us help many clients.

Nutrition Guide for Clinicians

Published by the well-known Physicians' Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), the Nutrition Guide for Clinicians is a simple app that all Doctors of Physical Therapy (DPT) should have installed on their phones. The app allows a clinician to easily look up a condition or diagnosis, and then scroll through easily summarized data on simple nutrition tips that can contribute or treat the disease. Authors of the app list copious studies in their references for PT...

It's exciting to see our team has been active in the community and online. Dr. Wells was featured in the online blog, Eat This Not That, over the past few years. Here are few excellent articles focused on nutrition, physical therapy, weight loss, and health.

By Dr. Sean M. Wells, DPT, PT, OCS, ATC/L, CSCS, NSCA-CPT, CNPT, Cert-DN

Weight Loss and Physical Therapy

Traditional physical therapy (PT) does an amazing job at treating dysfunction, pain, and problems. Preventative care and wellness, such as weight loss, was once taboo and often ignored by many physical therapists. However, today's Doctors of Physical Therapy (DPTs) are truly embracing more holistic treatments like nutrition, mindfulness, and sleep habits. Having physical therapy patients lose weight can help reduce inflammation, prevent health issues, and may improve PT outcomes. But what about stopping the weight gain in the first place? Weight gain prevention is vitally important, as it is much more difficult to lose the weight than it is to gain it. Given such interest in these topics, our team found it relevant to consider a recent study looking at weight gain and arthritis -- let's make the case for more PTs to start talking about patients preventing weight.

Arthritis and W...

The Oath

As many PTs and healthcare providers know and affirm: first, do no harm. Taken from one of the most widely known Greek Medical Texts, this oath commits doctors and healthcare providers to offering their best in care. The more modern version of this oath expounds:

"I swear to fulfill, to the best of my ability and judgment, this covenant: I will respect the hard-won scientific gains of those physicians in whose steps I walk, and gladly share such knowledge as is mine with those who are to follow."

Many physical therapists (PTs) have taken a similar oath. In DPT schools around the country, many student PTs (SPT) swear an oath to provide their best care prior to going into internship or clinicals. Upon entering the profession and joining the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA), we as PTs swear by the APTA code of ethics, which outlines: "Above all, do no harm." The APTA code of ethics also asks PTs to provide our best ability and judgement, among other requirements.

Physical therapists (PTs) are movement experts that help patients with Parkinson's regain function, activities, and engage better in life. Parkinson's disease (PD) affects the smoothness and ability to initiate movement. PTs can offer a myriad of exercises, activities, balance training, and walking interventions with decent results. The disease is usually be progressive, although intense exercise can delay this progression. What if PTs could offer an even greater edge for the patients to "beat" PD?

An early trial showed that a plant-based diet was able to lower the patients Hoyen-Yahr stage (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21535916).   Research has also begun to show that eating certain plant-based foods rich in nicotine containing compounds, like sweet peppers, may be important to preventing PD (see our other posts on this topic). Another review study highlighted the benefits of plant nutrients in improving or ameliorating neurodegeneration and chronic inflammation (https://www.s...