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Myofascial Release Therapist Looks Beyond Symptoms
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by Sheila Julson
management and veteriave Vollmers of Specialized nary sciences, but he later Therapy Service became uncertain about has a keen ability to think what he wanted to do. outside the box, which While working two eventually led him to the jobs—one as a bartender John F. Barnes’ Myofascial and one at the MilwauRelease (MFR) approach kee County Medical while working as an ocCollege morgue, where cupational therapist. When he obtained research Vollmers saw how the specimens—he thought hands-on method of treatabout how his high school ing restrictions of fascia girlfriend’s mother had (soft tissue) had helped a talked about occupational factory employee, he knew therapy. “For whatever he was on to something. reason, that stuck in the “My brain works as a meback of my mind,” he says. chanic. Wherever it takes He decided to call Curative Dave Vollmers me, it takes me, whether it’s Care to ask if he could conventional or not,” he says. shadow a therapist in their rehabilitative Fascia is the body’s connective tissue hand clinic. While there, he found that he and looks similar to the pith of an orliked that setting and returned to UWange, covering muscles and joints. Fascia Milwaukee, but he was unable to get into can eventually tighten, lose elasticity and the school’s occupational therapy program. become restrictive, Vollmers explains. While bartending one evening, he MFR uses gentle yet steady and sustained met a nurse that had told him about Conpressure to release fascia restrictions by cordia University’s new occupational thersoftening and elongating tissue. apy program. He applied and was accepted. “MFR is basically two theories,” he During one of his shifts at the morgue, he elaborates. “One: Never force, and you’ll happened to meet Dr. Leah Dvorak, who never injure. To do that, you have to get would end up being his anatomy profesrid of your ego and put patients first, asksor, as well as a powerful mentor while he ing them what they need. Two: You have pursued an occupational therapy degree. to listen to patients’ symptoms and look elsewhere for the cause. We have intelDiscovering Myofascial Release ligently designed bodies that know when After graduating from Concordia, Vollmers something is damaged from stress, poor eventually worked as the rehab and fitness posture or injury; it has to compensate. If director at the former Delphi Corp., in the left side is hurting, the right side will Oak Creek. It was there that he discovered take over.” the effectiveness of MFR, a treatment that Vollmers, an avid outdoorsman and softens and elongates fascia, thus increasa high school athlete, had attended coling range of motion, improving blood lege on and off throughout the University flow and stimulating the body’s autoimof Wisconsin system. He had originally planned to pursue a degree in wildlife mune response.
“A factory worker had neck pain and needed therapy, but he said, ‘You can’t help me. Everybody else has tried and failed,’” Vollmers recalls. Vollmers remembered that his wife, also a therapist, had once talked about MFR. Instinctively, Vollmers tried MFR on his patient with the neck pain. The patient left, still skeptical that he had been helped. “The next day, that burly guy came running toward me. At first, he seemed angry. I thought, ‘This isn’t going to end well,’” Vollmers laughs. “But he hugged me and said he had slept soundly for the first time in four years. He didn’t have any more neck pain.” Realizing MFR’s effectiveness, Vollmers heard that John F. Barnes, PT, would be in Madison to teach his gentle MFR technique, so he signed up for a class. “Barnes started talking about anatomy, and I soon realized he knew more than most of the anatomy professors I had studied under. At that point, it was clear I was in the right spot,” Vollmers says. When Delphi Corp. began downsizing and closing its U.S. plants, Vollmers decided to strike out on his own. In February 2002 he formed Specialized Therapy Services—a dedicated myofascial release clinic—which, for 16 years, was located at the intersection of 92nd and Center streets in Milwaukee before they moved to a larger location in Elm Grove. Vollmers has accumulated over 500 hours of courses, and has also worked for the Myofascial Release Treatment Centers and seminars as an assistant instructor to Barnes. He uses MFR to treat adults and children, and he incorporates reiki and craniosacral therapy into services. He accepts insurance. Helping people become mobile and pain-free motivates Vollmers every day. “When I hear people say things like ‘my back pain is gone,’ that’s why I do what I do,” he enthuses. Specialized Therapy Services is located at 890 Elm Grove Rd., Ste. 1-1, Elm Grove. For more information or to make an appointment, call 414-778-1341 or visit SpecializedTherapy Services.com. See ad, page 9. Sheila Julson is a freelance writer for Natural Awakenings magazine. January 2021
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