SUMMER Lopez, owner of Body Forte Ltd – a full service physiotherapy and pilates studio located at the Barbican Business Centre in Kingston – says enhancing the lives of clients is paramount to her team.

She told the Jamaica Observer in a recent interview that this is the core value shared by her team, and that the outfit is also known for its customer service, professional and calm environment, as well as the fact that they recognise that every patient or client has unique needs that must be addressed.

“Also, one of the main things we are known for, which is most important to all of us, is trying to find the cause of the problem versus just treating the symptoms,” Lopez said. “So, when we get a client for pilates or patient for physiotherapy, we are not just going to say ‘oh your hip hurts, so let’s just fix that’; we are going to look at their spine, their knee, we are going to figure out where the pain is coming from and re-educate them to make that problem better.”

The owner, who is also a physiotherapist and certified pilates instructor, also told Your Health Your Wealth that time delivery is also very important to her team.

But what makes them different?

“We enhance people’s lives by helping them move better, feel better, function better; we want them to function at their highest possible functional level,” Lopez explained. “We are your orthopaedic and neurological experts, and we deal with a wide range of ages and ability levels.”

She said that this is done through combining physiotherapy and pilates.

“We are the only physiotherapy and pilates-based studio in Kingston, if not maybe Jamaica, that uses (pilates) apparatus. And the reason we have chosen to use it is because it is very versatile.

“So, the pilates mat work is excellent, but the apparatus can make an exercise much easier if you have a weak, deconditioned patient, or it can make it much harder than the floor work if you have got an athlete that comes in that needs more of a challenge,” Lopez shared.

She said the decision was taken to incorporate pilates because of how it enhances the physiotherapy practice.

“Exposing patients to the principles of pilates is going to get them actively involved in the physiotherapy process. Principles such as balance, strengthening, coordination, flexibility, those are all things that as physiotherapists we work with our patients all the time, but working with the pilates apparatus and with the pilates principles just helps us to enhance that experience,” the studio owner told Your Health Your Wealth. “We get our patients to recover faster with longer lasting results and prevent reinjury.”

So, how exactly does it work?

“If we had an ankle patient come in – maybe they have broken their ankle, they have had ankle surgery and they are sent to us – we start off with our traditional physiotherapy,” Lopez shared, adding that this could include some tissue work as well as passive and hands-on range of motion-type things.

“Then we get them, especially if they are on weight-bearing restrictions, if the patient is not able to weight bear, not able to stand on their broken ankle, we can get them on the pilates apparatus using their hips, using their knees,” she said. “We are adhereing to their weight-bearing precautions. The doctor’s happy, the patient is happy, and they are making great progress.”

One such pilates apparatus is the jump board.

Lopez explained that the jump board is ideal for clients who want to get a great cardiovascular workout to work their legs and their core, and if they have joint issues.

She insisted that people do not have to have an existing condition to visit Body Forte Ltd.

“Our ideal client is anybody who takes an active interest in their long-term health. We are looking for clients who are interested in knowledge, clients who are interested in how to take the best care of themselves… So, we have young teenagers that come, we have men and women, we have 85-year-old clients that come and do physiotherapy and pilates here, we have professional athletes, we have recreational athletes. So we are really about all ages and ability levels,” Lopez said.

Body Forte Ltd, according to Lopez, through its physiotherapy and pilates synergy, has also helped cancer patients.

“After their treatment – any chemotherapy and radiation – typically they are very deconditioned, very weak,” Lopez said. “So, using the pilates techniques and just bringing them gently and slowly back to their full functional level is the way that we can directly help that population.”

The studio has been opened in Jamaica since 2009 and Your Health Your Wealth got a first-hand look at the different pilates apparatus used in the physiotherapy practice during a recent visit, as physiotherapists Dr Chithrah Cherian and Dr Wendi Peart as well as certified pilates instructor Wendy Martin-Haddad demonstrated.