Laurie's Blogs.

I’ve had a document sitting on my desk top for a few years now… (oh you should see my computer’s desk top!)  Anyways, it was a synopsis of the 2016 Sports Medicine Australia Conference, written by Mick Hughes (no relation), and for the life of me, I cannot recal where / how I came upon it!  However, it happened, back then, I must have had the smarts enough to copy and paste it into a document – knowing that the information contained within would be golden.  So, here goes.  I’m going to summarize one of the presentations already summarized in the document!

A Tendon lecture was given by Cook, Purdam, Rio, & Docking.  The biggest ‘take home messages’ could be condensed into two slides.  Firstly, “Preventing the 7 Deadly Sins of Tendon Management” (which seems to be referencing a paper – Drew 2016). They are:

1. Establish a moderate (protective) training load (High and low training loads are less protective)
2. Minimize the week-to-week changes (Avoid large spikes or reductions in load)
3. Do not exceed the workload ceiling of safety for the sport (Upper limit?)
4. Ensure a minimum training workload is maintained (avoid undertraining through selection, reduced workload, taper, travel or holiday scenarios) – reloading is the key
5. Avoid inconsistent ‘boom-bust’ workload patterns (don’t rest injuries unnecessarily or play catch-up)
6. Ensure training loads are proportionate to the workload demands of the sport (Prepare for camps – ‘load to withstand load’)
7. Monitor the athlete throughout the latent period (risk continues for 3-4 weeks after training load spikes)

The important thing here is to note that tendons love consistent training.  So, when we are dealing with a canine athlete, we need to think ‘which tendons tend to be most compromised?’  When we talk about Agility Dogs (these dogs being the hardest on their body), I would say shoulder issues are most prominent.  Thusly training that continues to load the supraspinatus, biceps tendon, and subscapularis in particular would be smart.  On the rears, exercises that load & target the iliopsoas would be critical, as would exercises that target quads and hams to protect the stifle joint.  Less frequent, would the carpal flexors and the calcaneal tendon.  Not to say they’re not important, but that they are injured far less often, and perhaps selecting some exercises that target the shoulder and have an additional benefit to the carpal flexors, or the quads with a bonus effect on the calcaneal tendon would be suffice for the latter.  All together these '7 Deadly Sins' say to me, that even during the ‘off season’ certain exercises should be maintained.

The second point that was made in the synopsis of the tendon lecture(s) was that even if the diagnostic ultrasound shows a confirmed degenerative tendinopathy… So What?!  You need to push that tendon to heal.  As well, the synopsis pointed out that a degenerative tendon may never remodel back to its original state, and that’s okay.  There is plenty to be gained by stimulating the healthy bits of the tendon around the degenerative part.  Pain improves and function improves.

Okay… so just sit with those thoughts for a while.  In the meantime, I’ll work on next week’s blog, to put together a few key exercises (in my opinion) to continue to do even in the ‘off season’, and to be ramped up just prior to re-engaging in training.

Until then…

Cheers!   Laurie