Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation

The Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation specialty handles with different medical branches, treating patients affected by skeletal-muscle, neurologic and respiratory pathologies.

The Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation department diagnoses ant treats these pathologies. Our doctors can treat patients affected by acute pain, like in case of accidents or injuries, and patients affected by chronic pain, like in case of skeletal-muscle degenerative pathologies (arthritis or rheumatologic diseases).

Aims

The department can treat patients affected by skeletal-muscle, neurologic and breathing pathologies caused by injuries, fractures, amputations or degenerative processes. Its aim is the recovery of the functionality after an inactivity period. The department handle with pathologies that affect the spine, like the nerve compression syndrome, the vertebral fracture, the lumbar pain and the cervical pain, with the help of physical therapies that involve the implicated limb. We can deal with adults, aged people, but also children, that can find a solution for problems correlated with child development like scoliosis, hyperkyphosis and hyperlordosis. The patient can solve these problems with the help of specific therapeutic gymnastic or with the help of insoles and adequate shoes.

The Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation department helps to patient in identifying his/her postural alterations, which is an important information in order to prevent potential future pathologies.

The physiatrists in MediClinic can handle also with neurological pathologies that affect the central and peripheral nervous system, like strokes, or with degenerative pathologies like the Parkinson disease or the multiple sclerosis. In particular, after the hospitalization, patients affected by a stroke can come to MediClinic to carry on with the rehabilitation; the physiatrist can help the patient in the post-stroke phase, when the acute phase has finished and start the functional recovery. In case of degenerative neurological diseases, the disability connected with the diseases can be treated in MediClinic, thanks to the neuromotor gymnastic and using the medical gym and the pool.

Why choose MediClinic?

In MediClinic we are equipped with advanced computerized systems that elaborate objective data. They evaluate the limbs functioning and they highlight also those pathologies that are difficult to notice without an appropriate device. This allow the physiatrist to notice step by step the improvements of the patient.

In MediClinic patients can find avantgarde devices that facilitate every kind of physical therapy, a modern medical gym equipped with specific devices for the posture correction and the muscle tone increasement, and a pool where patients can perform pool therapy. The Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation department can collaborate with the expertise of the orthopedic technician, in order to create insoles specific for the patient pathology.

Diagnosis

The patient arrives to the health care facility with a diagnosis that has to be confirmed with instrumental or imaging diagnostic systems. These systems have to be integrated with the postural evaluation and with the physical evaluation performed by the Physiatrist.

The Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation department uses advanced instrumental and imaging diagnostic services. Even for the traditional exams, MediClinic decided to be equipped with the most modern and innovative technologies. In Mediclinic the patient can perform all the most important exams to receive a physiatry diagnosis:

• Radiology
• 2D and 3D skeletal-muscle ultrasound
• MRI
• Electromyography

MediClinic is equipped also with some innovative diagnostic devices that allow to get a safer and more accurate diagnoses:

• Formetric spine and posture analysis
• Baropodometry exam and gait analysis
• Formetric spine and posture analysis

The Formetric spine and posture analysis is a non-invasive system used to evaluate the spine, lower limbs and pelvis postural alterations. Thanks to an infrared system and to reflective markers that project lights on the patient’s body, the physiatrist can examine postural alterations even in patients that were subjected to an injury. With the help of this procedure, the doctor can verify the entity of scoliosis, kyphosis and lordosis, obtaining objective values. Through this method, the doctor can also identify possible abnormal pelvis rotations or inclinations or pathologies that affects the spine and that are connected with postural alterations. We can perform this evaluation both in a static or in a dynamic position, with the help of a computerized platform. The physiatrist evaluates the gait and the balance alterations, considering pathologies like bunion, ligaments calcifications or tendinopathies.

Baropodometry exam and gait analysis

The Formetric spine and posture analysis can be integrated with the baropodometry exam and the Gait Analysis. These exams evaluate how the patient walk and the differences between how patients weight moves from side to side and front to back, the way the legs move at the ankle, knee and hip and possible alterations of the lower legs. The results allow to the orthopedic technician to realize a specific insole that will correct the dysfunction.

Proposed treatments

As per the Physical Medicine, the Physiatrist uses the main types of energy available in the nature to fasten the injuries recovery, to reduce inflammation and pain, to gradually reactivate the limbs and joints functionality and to stop the degenerative processes. In MediClinic the patient can find the most important physical therapies, that are performed with the most advanced devices on the marketplace:

• Lasertherapies
• Electric current
• Ultrasounds
• Ionic flow tecar therapy

Moreover, the Physiatrists in MediClinic can propose the use of devices for isokinetic, both for diagnostic and for therapeutic purposes. The patient can use the isokinetic devices in MediClinic, after the diagnosis for the muscle strength, to train the limb according to the test result. Finally, the computerized benches can help the patient in improving the limbs balance.

Pool therapy

The pool is another important resource available in MediClinic. The functional recovery programs that use water are an essential step for the rehabilitation, especially if they are performed by qualified physical therapists and in a dedicated setting, as happen for the MediClinic pool.

Sport pathologies

As for the sport pathologies, the physiatry departments aims to recovery the athlete functionalities in short times and using innovative technologies. The athlete postural alteration diagnosis in the basic movements (walking and running) allows to identify in a specific manner the postural alterations when training. The information gathered by the MediClinic’s doctors can be useful also for the athlete coach, that can collaborate in the recovery of the athlete abilities and, in the meantime, in the prevention of potential relapses or new pathologies.