Physical Therapy

  • Studies have continued to illustrate how beneficial physical therapy protocols and regimens can be for individuals in our community. They have illustrated that physical therapy can help “restore upright hemodynamics, [normalize] renal-adrenal responsiveness, and [improve] quality of life” (Fu et al., 2011).

  • They have also discovered that exercise training over short durations (in this specific study over the course of three months) can decrease the heart rate when upright through increasing baroreflex sensitivity (Galbreath et al., 2010). This being said, there is no one-size-fits-all approach.

  • Even when following specific protocols, such as the Levine Protocol and/or the Dallas/CHOP Protocol, the way individuals in our community respond to and tolerate certain exercises can vary considerably.

  • With many in our community navigating co-occurring diagnoses such as ME/CFS, EDS, and MCAS (just to name a few), it is important for physical therapists to be familiar with these other conditions and how they may impact exercise tolerance, the need for making modifications to exercises, and various other recommendations.

  • We have a section dedicated to reviewing more specifics located within our Physical Therapy section.

Sources:

Fu, Q., VanGundy, T. B., Shibata, S., Auchus, R. J., Williams, G. H., & Levine, B. D. (2011). Exercise training versus propranolol in the treatment of the postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome. Hypertension, 58(2), 167–175. https://doi.org/10.1161/hypertensionaha.111.172262

Galbreath, M. M., Shibata, S., VanGundy, T. B., Okazaki, K., Fu, Q., & Levine, B. D. (2010). Effects of exercise training on arterial-cardiac baroreflex function in pots. Clinical Autonomic Research, 21(2), 73–80. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10286-010-0091-5