Staying Healthy in a Professional Company
Title: Staying Healthy in a Professional Company
On this episode, Heather Southwick was interviewed. Heather Southwick is the Director of Physical Therapy for Boston Ballet managing the health and wellness program for the company dancers. Her position includes providing daily injury prevention, management and rehabilitation care to the professional company dancers of the Boston Ballet. Prior experience was at Boston Children’s Hospital as a staff physical therapist for 15 years with a contract to provide services to the Boston Ballet company and school. She also has experience with musical theater treating on Broadway and touring companies for numerous shows such as “The Lion King”, “Hairspray”, “Cats” and has traveled on tour with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. Education includes a B.A from Mount Holyoke College with a double major in Dance and Psychology and M.S.P.T from Simmons College.
Heather routinely teaches physical therapy students and is an APTA credentialed clinical instructor. She also teaches medical fellows from the division of sports medicine about the unique diagnoses seen in dancers in a weekly onsite medical clinic at the Boston Ballet. She frequently presents at conferences and continuing medical education courses. She has been invited to be the keynote speaker at multiple conferences speaking on topics such the dancer’s hip, injury prevention, the dancer’s foot and ankle, and current screening practices in the USA for professional dancers.
Some of her recent publications include two chapters in Preventing Injuries in the Young Dancer, edited by Lyle J. Micheli, MD, “Nutcracker Fracture in a Ballet Dancer Performing in the Nutcracker” and “A Preseason Cardiorespiratory Profile of Dancers in 9 Professional Ballet and Modern Companies” both published in the Journal of Dance Medicine and Science.
Heather is an active member of the Dance USA Task Force on Dancer Health and manages the research protocol for the standardized screening and injury surveillance projects for professional dancers. She is also a member of the International Association of Dance Medicine and Science and the Performing Arts Medical Association.
Show Information:
Mission: On Physiotherapy Performance Perspectives (PPP), Dr. Jenna Kantor, performer and physical therapist, interviews individuals on health in the performing arts. In this monthly podcast, we aim to help performing artists gain a better understanding of how their body works, how to reduce risk of injury, what Physical Therapy for performing artists entails, and how to maximize performance potential.
Disclaimer: This podcast is for entertainment purposes and is not medical advice.
Website: http://ptperformancepersp.wixsite.com/home
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Host: Jenna Kantor
Music: Bret Autrey vs. Ella Fitzgerald - Puttin on the Ritz (Irving Berlin & Taco)
Music License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode
