Laryngeal Awareness Through Manual Therapy

2024 Voice Foundations Symposium Workshop Proposal
Laryngeal awareness through manual therapy

Manual therapy intervention that has long been a component of voice professionals seeking to improve laryngeal posture, but how does that occur? Are we creating lasting, measurable alterations in resting posture, or simply improving the individual’s ability to control and modify that space? In this workshop we will look at those concepts and apply some easy-to-apply, hands-on exploration. Through these experiences the participant will further their understanding of how interventions may work, beyond the simplistic explanations. Manual therapy is often said to address specific tissue-based problems at the peripheral level. But with what has been described over the past decade, we know it has value far beyond those local impacts.
This workshop will provide ample hands-on experiences where participants will have the opportunity to experience a one-on-one engagement of the fundamental principles of this work. The emphasis of this workshop will be to educate the participant to the possibilities of engaging issues of voice and vocal dysfunction through direct touch and manual therapy evaluation, with logical carryover into intervention. Application to an evidence-based model will be presented through handouts.

Learning objectives would include:
1. Provide the participant a brief overview of the Foundations Approach to manual therapy as it applies to the treatment of vocal dysfunction, with a strong emphasis on a patient-directed model
2. Provide differing and, perhaps, controversial views on how laryngeal height is impacted with intervention.
3. Provide the participant opportunities to explore vocal experiences via hands-on experience using the core principles of the Foundations Approach to manual therapy

Walt Fritz, PT, presents the Foundations in Manual Therapy: Voice and Swallowing Disorders seminars and owns the Pain Relief Center in Upstate New York. He has taken the traditional manual therapy narratives (manual circumlaryngeal treatment, myofascial release, etc.) and applied a patient-directed model of evaluation and treatment that better aligns with current literature. To combat clinician biases, shared decision-making is a core principle used through the coursework.