Hi E!
I saw that you had signed up successfully! Hooray!
It was nice to meet you as well, and I’m glad you enjoyed the course!
In regards to your shockwave questions:
We no longer use gel. The manufacturer told us that the only reason to use gel was to be able to slide the unit over the body part. This makes good sense when dealing with a human (our skin doesn’t slide so well) or a hairless dog or cat. We find however that the unit slides quite well through fur. With radial shockwave, there is no need to create an interface - as you do with ultrasound machines or even the Focused shockwave units.
I use my radial shockwave on the lumbosacral junction for L-S Disc Disease… and it’s miraculous. I first got the idea while visiting Fitzpatrick Referral Centre in England and while on tour of their facility, I noticed that a number of dogs were in for L-S Shockwave. When I asked more about it, the reply was that they were not only doing it, but seeing great results as well. I came home and tried it with two cases of mine and was delighted. I’ve been using it as a standard pard of my L-S protocol ever since. I don’t use it on other discs however. The L-S junction is unique in that you can directly target nerves (and perhaps the disc) without the spinal cord being there to worry about. I would still be nervous about using shockwave along the spine elsewhere… that being said, I do feel comfortable using RADIAL shockwave to target nerves… but not the spinal cord. (At least, at this time of writing and/or unless shown otherwise.)
There is some great information on shockwave and osteoarthritis. Check out the FourLeg Newsletter Archives for some article reviews: I put them all in one place at
www.fourleg.com/Shockwave. The newsletters are specifically 2015 Volume 4; Issues 1 A (and then 1B…I had so many articles), and also 2016 Volume 5; Issue 3. I shockwave around the joint. Studies show that you can target inside the joint or on the bone just adjacent to the articular surface to have an effect on the joint. As well, I look for trigger points / areas of tension near an affected joint (i.e. deep gluteal in a hip OA case). So really, you can’t go wrong!!!
I hope this helps!
Cheers,
Laurie