Description

This module concludes the program by awarding Level III Certification. Yoga as Lifestyle Medicine III provides the remaining tools in the Lifestyle Medicine toolbox in order to use Functional & Integrative Medicine principles to fully address holistic care, all through the lens of Yoga.

The toolbox includes Ayurvedic philosophy and application, sound, music, and the voice in therapeutic application, Orofacial Assessment & Intervention (this lab teaches both external and internal evaluative techniques), Sacroiliac Joint Assessment and Intervention, and an in depth study of safe use of Inversions and Semi-Inversions in clinical application. These include nonaxial loading headstand, noncervical loading shoulderstand, and all semi-inversions outlined in Medical Therapeutic Yoga. 

Through multiple interactive labs and case studies, the clinicians will come away with an evidence-based systematic method for teaching safe inversions, as well as a more complete understanding of how ancient yoga philosophy is relevant in today’s medical model.  

Clinicians will have multiple opportunities to demonstrate understanding of how to affect population health through behavioral science, psychology, and the intersection between psychotherapy and rehabilitation. This module will prepare the clinician to being using Lifestyle Medicine in her/his practice, including how to impact stress management, pain, environmental and vocational health, sleep, nutrition, movement, mindfulness, and psycho-emotional-spiritual wellbeing. Functional and Integrative Medicine play integral roles in impacting public health and health promotion in practice, and this module will equip the clinician to affect social determinants of health as well as be more effective in patient care and program management. Finally, the Ayurvedic component will teach the clinician how to incorporate use of the doshic, gunas, and attribute analyses into the broader conceptual model in order to complete the entire holistic evaluation and management paradigm.

Date(s)

2023-24

This virtual portion of Level III is available on demand.

In-Person Weekend Retreat (24 hours held Friday-Sunday) in Valle Crucis, NC - Thursday April 11 - Sunday April 14, 2024.  Register for Lodging and Meals HERE

Clinical Objectives

• Discuss best-evidence psychobiological and neurophysiological rationale of utilizing yogic philosophy in Lifestyle Medicine. 
• Demonstrate proficiency with systems-based mindful movement therapy and postural modification in order to apply yoga as Lifestyle Medicine. 
• Practice best evidence biomechanics and progression of inversions, including headstands, shoulderstands, and semi-inversions, and their modifications and contraindications for use in safe rehabilitation and wellness care. 
• Apply principles of Lifestyle Medicine & Ayurveda, to include integrative and functional medicine, in order to accurately use yoga in skilled, billable therapy services. 
• Incorporate postures and their modifications from Level I and II trainings into case studies applicable to Level III topics. 
• Demonstrate competence with Orofacial Assessment and intervention, including both external and internal examination and intervention.  
• Demonstrate competence with Sacroiliac Joint assessment & intervention.
• Describe, based on best-evidence, the importance of sound, both in music and vocal production, in order to affect the musculoskeletal, neuromuscular, and neuroendocrine systems, and thus, improve therapy outcomes. 
• Explain the scientific interrelationship of yoga and Ayurveda with rehabilitation and wellness care in managing non-communicable and chronic lifestyle-related diseases. 
• Discuss five element theory, the guiding precepts of Ayurveda, and the governing non-theistic cosmic and physiological philosophy of its practice in order to understand how it overlaps with modern neuroanatomy, physics, psychophysiology, and nutrition. 
• Distinguish between translation, location, elemental makeup, and mental qualities of systems-based disease states. 
• Demonstrate understanding of Ayurvedic constitutions and their respective parameters through identification of best-evidence methods for intervention in skilled therapy and medical settings. 
• Critical analysis of constitutional differences in physical attributes, anatomical structure, physiology, orthopedic presentation, gastrointestinal function, and receptive and expressive language to understand how they affect prevention and management of acute and chronic disease states. 
• Demonstrate clinical competence in application of manual therapy, yoga-based soft tissue mobilization, and biofeedback techniques during yoga postures to improve patient outcomes in skilled therapy services. 
• Practice across-the-lifespan Lifestyle Coaching skills through a yogic lens that can be applied in skilled, licensed clinical and wellness-based practice.
• List the effects that polytrauma and comorbidities typically seen in rehabilitative and wellness-based patient care have on the (3) diaphragm (throat, respiratory, pelvic) system and subsequent yogic locks system, and vice-versa. 
• Identify musculoskeletal and neuromuscular physiological and biomechanical factors in the trunk, upper, and lower limb through the lens of yoga postures and breath that would affect ADL or recreational participation and functional movement and outcomes.  
• Practice best-evidence therapeutic sequencing and postural progression(s) with gender sensitivity and specificity. 
• List anti-inflammatory properties of foods and culinary approaches which can be used in Lifestyle Coaching and patient care. 
• Develop a best-evidence culinary skill set to foster improved nutritional resource utilization and lifestyle choices in the at-risk patient with non-communicable chronic pain or disease. 
• Identify the components of Lifestyle Medicine according that includes integrative and Functional Medicine used in the Medical Therapeutic Yoga model of practice. 
• Identify compensatory neuromuscular, musculoskeletal, and psychophysiological patterns which could impair safe execution of rehabilitation or wellness care in licensed practice. 
• Integrate best-evidence Yogic Medicine, Lifestyle Medicine, & Functional Medicine practices into clinical practice in order to prescribe skilled therapy and/or intervention according to the practitioner’s scope of practice. 
• Describe the synergistic relationship of universal structure in yogic medicine and its overlap with modern physics, Polyvagal Theory, and interoception and proprioception. 
• Demonstrate proficiency with Lifestyle Medicine-based evaluation and management of live patient models using a biopsychosocial yogic model of care that is commensurate with the practitioner’s scope of practice and license.
• Design biopsychosocial, systems-based, Lifestyle Medicine plans of care for individual and group-based therapy to improve patient outcomes. 
• Identify styles of management and factors in creating business organizational structure that can affect insurance-based and cash-based practice. 
• Identify current trends in health promotion, population health, yoga and yoga therapy regulation that can impact the licensed practitioner. 
• Identify scope of practice and legal concerns for using yoga in skilled therapy, wellness, and/or medical settings. 
• Troubleshoot emerging trends in risk management, business development, and patient care via multidisciplinary lab sessions. 

Outline

• Gender Sensitive & Trauma Informed Teaching

• Pain Management in Lifestyle Medicine 

• Behavioral Change in Biopsychosocial Care

• Ayurvedic & Yogic Philosophy in Lifestyle Medicine Practice 

• Advanced Application of Functional Movement Assessment (FMA)

• Expanded Mindful Breathwork & Posture Prescription 

• Clinical Case Studies - Systems-Based Evaluation for Complex Patients

• Meditation & Stress Management 

• Orofacial Diagnostics & Intervention

• Sacroiliac Joint Kinematics Diagnostics & Intervention 

• Nutritional & Pharmacology Considerations 

• Music, Voice, & Sound in Intervention including Vocal Preservation & Optimization Lab

• Group & Individual Therapy Postural Sequencing

• Yoga Props Education

• Visceral Mobilization & Myofascial Release ·       

• Business of Lifestyle Medicine & MTY 

• Research Methods

• Oral Practical

• Case Community Competency Project (CCC) & Exit Exam (done outside of class)
  
  
  

CE

A total of 38 CE is awarded. CEU's will be awarded after completion of both weekends. We are an approved PT & OT Provider (see below).