The Bertele method has been developed by Dr Laura Bertelé, specialist in Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation, psychologist, and consultant to the rehabilitation centre Gino Rigamonti, in which different movement and posture specialists collaborate.

It is a method based on the principles of the method of the French physiotherapist Francoise Mézières. Laura Bertelé was one of her students and became a collaborator, teaching the method in Italy and abroad.

Mézières observed that in the human body the muscles form functional units called muscular chains: there are five muscular chains, made up of many muscles linking between themselves, which behave as if they were only one over-short, over-strong muscle.
These chains are five big ‘elastic bands’ that compress us and deform us, causing pain and limitation of movements.

The Bertelé method is different from the Mézières method because it considers the human being in its psycho-physical totality, and so each pain, deformity, contracture is considered as a symptom of discomfort, of a deeper suffering, in other words of a relational difficulty, of communication of the person with themselves and with the surrounding environment. The Bertelé method provides integration of the work on the body with listening to music. Because of this the first visit or audio-psycho-postural assessment includes a postural-psycho-audio evaluation while still and in movement, and also an evaluation of the audio and listening capacities of the patient by means of a listening test.
In this way it is possible to establish a program of postural and psychomotor re-education. The work on the body is preceded and accompanied by listening to pieces of music in which are frequency bands programmed according to the initial test emphasized.

The listening favours and facilitates the psycho-physical change, given that the music is an irreplaceable source of energy which recharges that part of the central nervous system known as the reticular formation, which is on one hand responsible for the higher cortical activities (attention, concentration, waking) and on the other for the modulation of the basal muscle tone.

THE AIM OF THE METHOD

Is therefore on one hand to stretch those ‘elastic bands’ which should never be strengthened, thus allowing the body to rediscover its own correct position and to recover the mobility of the articulations restricted by these muscles; at the same time the method tries to help the individual to de-code the message that comes from their depths, from their unconsciousness.


FOR WHOM IS IT INDICATED?

The method is indicated for those who want to improve their posture, their motor capacities, their physical status (musicians, dancers, actors, athletes), for all those who want to, so to speak, feel better with their body. For those who present with muscular and articular problems, acute (for example, tendonitis, sequelae of strains, fractures, dislocations, peri-arthritis, lumbago, neck pains, sciatica, slipped disc) and chronic (arthrosis, scoliosis, rheumatic diseases). It can be used also with great success also for congenital and acquired neurological diseases (for example, hemiplegia, spastic tetraplegia).

The sessions are strictly individual, last from half an hour to an hour, and the patients may be of any age.

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