March Muscle Madness

 Dry Needling For You’s Kickoff Event

March Muscle Madness!

Photo by Alexander Jawfox on Unsplash

The Deal: For an introductory time, through March, we are waiving evaluation fees! All sessions are $80. Act fast, limited sessions are available!

Why? To bring community awareness to dry needling for pain relief and to promote the new St. Petersburg small business Dry Needling For You!

For Whom? Adults with unresolved or new sciatica, headaches, back pain, frozen shoulder, bursitis, tendinitis, rotator cuff injuries, sprains, strains, radiating symptoms, joint pain, plantar fasciitis, tennis elbow, hip pain, knee pain, shoulder pain. 

Location: Dry Needling For You @ Valverde Chiropractic, 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, FL 

Hours: Monday, Tuesday, Friday 9-6 BY APPOINTMENT ONLY!

YES, I’d like to schedule an appointment! Call or text (813) 922-8757, email, or visit the website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com

Do you have questions about dry needling? Be sure to check out these blogs for more information:

*What is dry needling?

*Who can have dry needling? A review of contraindications.

*How does dry needling work?

*Who is Dry Needling For You?

*What does a session cost?

Rate Sheet Dry Needling For You

 Curious About Dry Needling, St. Pete?

Customized Pain Relief

Transparency in Billing, No Surprises!

Free consult 15 min (phone or in-person)

Initial evaluation, intake, and history taking + first treatment (45-60 min) $120-160

Brief follow-up treatment (15 min) $45

Standard follow-up treatment (30 min, MOST COMMON) $80

Complex follow-up treatment (45 min) $120

Cash, Checks, Credit Cards, HSA

All fees are due at the time of service. We do not honor letters of protection or wait until your lawsuit is complete for payment.

**No insurance billing available** 

**If you need a receipt, let us know**

**If you have a legal team that will be requesting notes, let us know**

Provider: Julie Schumann, PT  Experienced dry needling since 2012.

Location: Dry Needling For You @ Valverde Chiropractic (please don't call them directly, call the number below!), 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, FL

Phone: (813) 922-8757 call or text for appointments

Email for appointments

Website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com

What is dry needling?

Can I have dry needling done on me? Review of contraindications.

How does dry needling work?

Photo by Alexander Mils on Unsplash

Out of the Game Due to Elbow Pain?

 Get the Sting Back in Your Swing

Photo by Braden Egli on Unsplash

Elbow pain got your activities halted? Is it tendinitis? Is it epicondylitis? Is it tennis or golfer's elbow? Is it really a shoulder or neck problem? Is it from a new injury or just a bit of overuse?

What have you done about it?

Taken ibuprofen, acetaminophen, and naproxen sodium

Rested it

Stretched it

Exercised it

Swung it around

Ignored it

Asked a friend for advice

Asked Facebook for advice

Asked Google for advice

Iced it

Heated it

Wore a compression brace

Modified or halted painful activities

Not slept well in a long time

Saw your doctor

Saw your chiropractor

Saw your physical therapist

Saw your potential surgeon

Taken pain medications

Considered or received injections

Gotten a massage

Had X-Rays and/or MRI

Thinking about or have had surgery

And………You still have elbow pain!

The time has come to find your dry needler. Your dry needler is your muscle and nerve detective. We look at pain patterns, feel your pain patterns, and make educated decisions based on your medical history on what tissues could be causing the issues. 

Truth is, elbow pain can be coming from neck and/or shoulder dysfunction. Elbow pain can be coming from muscles in your neck, chest, rotator cuff, shoulder, upper arm, or lower arm muscles. Specifically, let's name some possibilities: pectoralis major & minor, subclavius, coracobrachialis, biceps, triceps, supraspinatus, infraspinatus, brachioradialis, extensor carpi radialis longus, extensor digitorum, supinator, and/or multifidus at the spinal levels (C4-C8). Often, an injection is too specifically located to solve the problem. If you have unresolved symptoms, it might be a good idea to find a muscle & nerve detective. Find your dry needler.

Dry Needling For You, St. Pete!

Provider: Julie Schumann, PT

Location: Valverde Chiropractic (please don't call the main phone at Valverde), 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, Fl  33710

Limited appointment times: Monday, Tuesday, and Friday

Rates: $80-160 per session

Email for an appointment or to discuss whether this type of treatment might help.

Call or text (813) 922-8757

Website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com

Disclosure: I have been a proponent, clinician, and client of dry needling services for the past 10+ years. It is the one tool that I have used in my 22+ year physical therapy career that consistently offers clients at least a fairly rapid change in their symptoms. Honestly, when I get injured or have pain that I can’t shake, it is the help of a dry needling provider that I seek first and foremost. ***This is my personal experience, preference, and knowledge base. This is not a substitute for you seeking your own medical advice.

FAQs, please see my other blogs

What is dry needling?

Am I a candidate to try dry needling? A Review of contraindications.

How does dry needling work?

Dry Needling For You

 Dry Needling For You, LLC

St. Petersburg, Florida

Established January 2023

Welcome!

Provider: Julie Schumann, PT

Mission: I am determined to provide skilled, effective, transparent, personal, ethical dry needling/physical therapy services. The physical therapy profession has been taken over by the big insurance industry which has led to clients being treated like numbers, not individuals. Today’s physical therapists cannot keep up with the productivity, documentation, and corporate expectations to maintain profitability. Sadly, it is common practice to have high-volume clinics, in which multiple clients are “cared” for at the same time, because insurance reimbursements are low. This often means that your skilled physical therapy consists of riding an exercise bicycle or stretching theraband for a certain number of minutes or repetitions. I refuse to be a part of these corporations. My mission is to provide skilled, effective, transparent, personal, and ethical services.

Specialty: Dry Needling for your everyday aches, pains, and injuries: low back pain, sciatica, bursitis, hip pain, knee pain, plantar fasciitis, sprains and strains, radiating pain, headaches, TMJ, rotator cuff injuries, shoulder pain, neck pain, elbow pain, frozen shoulder, IT band syndrome, degenerative disc disease, osteoarthritis, radiculopathy.

I've worked with all types of clients including cross-fitters, ultra runners, hikers, weekend warriors, and couch potatoes addressing acute and chronic injuries and ongoing pain syndromes.

Physical Therapist since 2000

Dry Needling since 2012

Session Rates: $80-160

Office Location: Valverde Chiropractic, 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, FL  33710

For an appointment please email or call or text (813) 922-8757

Website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com

FAQ's, please see my other blogs

What is dry needling?

Am I a candidate to try dry needling? A Review of contraindications.

How does dry needling work?

Sunshine on my Shoulders

 Shoulder Pain

What You May Have Done For It:

Taken ibuprofen, acetaminophen, and naproxen sodium

Rested it

Stretched it

Exercised it

Ignored it

Asked a friend for advice

Asked Facebook for advice

Asked Google for advice

Iced it

Heated it

Wore a sling

Not slept on it

Not slept well in a long time

Saw your doctor

Saw your chiropractor

Saw your physical therapist

Saw your potential surgeon

Taken pain medications

Gotten injections

Gotten a massage

Had X-Rays and/or MRI

Thinking about or have had surgery

And………You still have shoulder pain!

As a physical therapist of over 20 years and a dry needler for 10+ years, if you consulted with me, I would certainly ask you if you have tried dry needling. I would explain to you why and how it might help, whether it’s appropriate to try it on you, and find out if you are willing to try it since you have “tried everything.”  I’d be educating you about your rotator cuff, scapular, neck, thoracic, and arm nerves and muscles. Dry needling is not a miracle or cure-all. It may or may not help you. It may take a few or many follow-up sessions and a combination of all of the other things you have been doing for it. Dry needling may very likely speed up the healing process and decrease the pain. It may also have you rethinking surgical options, which should always be a last-case scenario. Just my 2 cents.

Brief Anatomy and Possible Key Players:

Muscles: supraspinatus, infraspinatus, subscapularis, teres minor, upper trapezius, levator scapulae, rhomboids, teres major, latissimus dorsi, serratus anterior, pectoral major and minor, deltoid, biceps, triceps, coracobrachialis, cervical and thoracic multifidus

Nerves: Cervical and Thoracic nerves originating at C5, C6, C7, C8, T1, T2, T3, T4

Common diagnoses: Rotator cuff injury/tear, thoracic outlet syndrome, cervical radiculopathy, labral tear, subluxation, dislocation, rotator cuff repair, neck pain, shoulder pain/strain

Dry Needling For You, St. Pete!

Provider: Julie Schumann, PT

Location: Valverde Chiropractic, 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, Fl  33710

Limited appointment times: Monday, Tuesday, and Friday

Email for an appointment or to discuss whether this type of treatment might help.

Website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com

Who Am I?

 

(Image from Treasure Island Kite Festival, 2023)

Thanks For Asking!!!

At this stage of life’s game, I am a wanderer, a skeptic, an introvert, a half-glass-full type, a realist, a problem solver, a mom, an ex, an optimist, a friend, a dance-like-nobody-is-watching type, an every-moment-is-precious type, a listener and a sounding board, a live-in-the-present type because your past can clog you up and your future is unknown.

How Did I End Up In St. Pete?

I have lived in New York, Australia (briefly), and Colorado for 97% of my life. A whirlwind of a love story gone bad and having to pick up the pieces quickly brought me to Florida. I’ve traveled thousands of miles on my own through a personal journey taking me from emotionally heartbroken to emotionally heart-centered. I may tell you about it someday when I get to know you.

What Do I Love About St. Pete?

The beauty, the climate, the diversity, the hustle, the quiet, the laughter, the music, the tides, the dolphins, the manatee, the pelicans, the sunrises, the sunsets, the ingenuity, the trees, the brick streets, the ‘happiness’ signs, the independence of small business, the artistry, the creativity, the murals, the music (oops, I said that again), the curiosity, the sense of community, the connections, the passion.

(A night at The Blueberry Patch, Gulfport, Fl)

(A Gulfport sunset)

(A mural and a ride on PedalPub St. Pete)

Why Do I Practice and Promote Dry Needling?

Dry needling is a technical offshoot of my career foundation as a licensed physical therapist. It is what I do to help people. It is a technique for pain relief and functional recovery. Stand-alone, it is nothing. Combined with the medical thought process, anatomical knowledge, questioning, realistic expectations, time for the client, listening to the client, and the coaching client to pursue their goals (standing, walking, running, sports, working, lifting, caring for others, caring for self, etc.) dry needling then becomes a dynamic and personal part of healthcare. I enjoy being a dynamic and personal part of healthcare.

What Will You Get From Me?

My attention.

A face-to-face discussion of your history, limitations, and goals.

Medically and anatomically based decision making.

Experienced dry needling care. I’ve been doing this for over 10 years.

Realistic expectations.

Honesty. If I don’t think I can help, I will tell you so.

Hopefully, some humor and laughter.

You may learn about my life’s journey and possibly I will learn about yours!

A brief history of my dry needling education and experience:

In 2009 I took my first dry needling class and was interested but a bit too nervous to use the technique on clients consistently, so I stopped. In 2012, I decided to take the beginner class again. This time I followed through and started ‘needling’ people. I completed my certification with intermediate and advanced dry needling classes. I began to love performing dry needling about a decade ago and have continued to use it on my clients whenever possible. As described in my blogs, dry needling has been a helpful tool for the treatment of many neuromuscular conditions such as sciatica, sprains, strains, low back pain, neck pain, shoulder pain, TMJ pain, headaches, bursitis, tendinitis, plantar fasciitis, whiplash, subluxations, rotator cuff injuries, thoracic outlet syndromes, stenosis, and degenerative disc diseases.

Currently, I practice in St. Petersburg, FL. I see a limited number of patients per week so that I can give each patient the attention to pathology and treatment techniques needed. 

Office location: Valverde Chiropractic, 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, FL  33710

Availability: Monday, Tuesday, and Friday

Website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com

To schedule an appointment please email me or call or text at (813) 922-8757 and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

She Blinded Me With Science

Could There Really Be A Therapeutic Effect?

So, your friend told you to try dry needling for your shoulder pain. Now what? Search Google for dry needling to see what it is and how it might help. Here is a brief synopsis of what might be taking place when a thin needle is inserted into muscles and tendons. If you checked out of high school science and are currently being guided by your emotions, you can skip this. You can check out my earlier blogs about dry needling: What’s the Point and Should I Stay or Should I Go Now.

The goal of incorporating dry needling into the therapeutic plan is to desensitize supersensitive structures (trigger points), calm the nervous system, improve/restore range of motion and function, and possibly create a healing response in tissues such as muscle, tendon, and nerve. My brain certainly does not hold onto the names of chemicals, nerve and muscle fibers, pathways, or chemistry so these are basic summaries of what I’ve learned in the past. If you seek more thorough microscopic descriptions I can likely (possibly) point you in the direction of sources or links.

There is still uncertainty about the actual mechanisms of healing, but these are the theories:

1. Chemical Effects: Normalizing the chemical components (bradykinin, CGRP, Substance P) of painful trigger points. Needle insertion will cause micro-trauma, micro-bleeding which encourages platelet-derived growth factor into the local tissues, causing an inflammatory and healing response.

2. Mechanical Effects: Trigger point dry needling may mechanically disrupt the dysfunctional chemical synapses at the motor end plate. This may be attributable to needle techniques such as spinning or pistoning which often cause LTRs (Local Twitch Responses) which in return may improve muscle fiber length or inhibit antagonistic muscles.

3. Neurophysiological Effects: Some hypotheses suggest dry needling may cause ascending and descending nerve conduction pathway changes at the spinal cord level that lead to decreased pain.

4. Electrophysiological Effects: There is also the possibility that eliciting a local twitch response may use excessive acetylcholine (ACh) that was causing spontaneous electrical activity (SEA) in the pain region. The metal needle may have an influence on decreasing SEA.

So, whatever is happening with needle insertion, it seems to offer benefits. I have been a proponent, clinician, and client of dry needling services for the past 10+ years. It is the one tool that I have used in my 22+ year physical therapy career that consistently offers clients at least a fairly rapid change in their symptoms. Honestly, when I get injured or have pain that I can’t shake, it is the help of a dry needling provider that I seek first and foremost. ***This is my personal experience, preference, and knowledge base. This is not a substitute for you seeking your own medical advice.

If you are interested in reading about who should and should not try needling due to absolute contraindications, and relative contraindications please read the blog here.

___________________________________________________________________________

Dry Needling For You, St. Pete!

Provider: Julie Schumann, PT

Location: Valverde Chiropractic, 5203 Central Avenue, St. Petersburg, Fl  33710

Limited appointment times: Monday, Tuesday, and Friday

Email for an appointment or to discuss whether this type of treatment might help.

Website: www.dryneedlingforyou.com