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Functional Soft Tissue Featuring FAKTR

by Mar 10, 2017

Home » Chiropractic Student Blog - Florida » Functional Soft Tissue Featuring FAKTR

This past weekend, I attended a hands-on certification class for Functional and Kinetic Treatment with Rehabilitation, or FAKTR for short. It is pronounced “factor.” The FAKTR technique has been developed by some of the most influential sports doctors in the world including Dr. Greg Doerr, Dr. Tom Hyde, Dr. Warren Hammer, and Dr. Mike Schneider. All of the aforementioned doctors are brilliant and have contributed a lot to the field. If you haven’t heard of them definitely check them out.

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I had the pleasure and privilege of shadowing Dr. Greg Doerr back in New Jersey thanks to a recommendation made by a professor at NUHS. After witnessing his hands-on soft tissue treatment, kinesiology taping, functional rehab exercises, and unique application of Instrument Assisted Soft Tissue Manipulation or IASTM, I knew I had a lot to learn.

We were exposed to IASTM and kinesiology taping in soft tissue class during 5th trimester, but I wanted to take it a step further. Instead of taking Graston, I chose FAKTR because it is the evolution of Graston Technique in my opinion. We also cannot take a Graston class until we are within one year of graduation, but FAKTR does not have said restriction.

The class was held at Elite Strength and Conditioning in Tampa, Florida. The weekend consisted of 14.5 hours of hands-on application of functional soft tissue concepts. Dr. Doerr actually rewrote the class from FAKTR to functional soft tissue because he isn’t just teaching IASTM. We learned functional movement assessments, hands-on myofascial release techniques, IASTM, and rehab exercises for many of the most common conditions.

There are five concepts of FAKTR and three types of applications. We went through the different concepts, why they work, and how to clinically apply them. The technique was extremely effective. We were able to correct abnormal movements and muscle firing dysfunctions within minutes by applying the FAKTR concepts.

There were about 18 people in the class, which helped out, because there was always at least one person in the class with the condition we were learning to treat. In the two days, we went through the entire body, and we learned how to progress through our treatments, which will improve our patient outcomes.

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All of us who took the class can also take the exam to become certified FAKTR providers upon graduation. Not only is the knowledge applicable to many of the neuromusculoskeletal conditions that we will be faced with on a daily basis, we will be able to market ourselves to a wider population and show potential employers that we took extra initiative while in school. I just had to purchase a FAKTR tool at the conclusion of the weekend. We were given a 33% discount on tools that weekend and that is an offer I couldn’t pass up. The FAKTR tools are made of stainless surgical steel. They are of the highest quality of IASTM tools available.

It was a long weekend but absolutely worth it. I learned so much and I cannot wait to use this new technique to treat my future patients.

That’s all for this week, if you have any questions please email me at [email protected]

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About the Author

Christopher Kotwicki

Christopher Kotwicki

My name is Christopher Kotwicki and I am a future Doctor of Chiropractic! I am also a self-proclaimed beach bum, animal lover, fitness junkie, and sports fanatic.

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