[BE W EL L] P H Y S I C A L T H E R A P Y
What you should know (about that body part) By Elizabeth Sehon Illustrations by Amber Davis
Pelvic-Floor Disorders
66 She was 23 when she first experienced pelvic pain. She had no idea what was happening to her body after numerous attempts to find the source of the pain, and her health care providers were silent on a solution. “Everyone kept telling me that everything was fine, and no one would listen,” Louise Vraney says. Louise now holds these answers with a doctorate in physical therapy and is a certified lymphedema therapist at SporTherapy in southwest Fort Worth. She is a pelvic-floor health care professional. Later, an obstetrician-gynecologist removed vaginal tissue for a biopsy and confirmed nothing was life-threatening and diagnosed Louise with a condition unknown to many — a
weakened pelvic floor. Now 33, she says her diagnosis and the physical therapy to correct her weakened pelvic floor was “life changing.” After a few years of practicing physical therapy, she began a specialty in the treatment of pelvic-floor disorders. Louise now performs thorough pelvic floor exams with a list of patient questions about urinary health, bowel health, vaginal health, and obstetric/gynecologic history that are specific to each patient. She also provides an internal exam for further evaluation, which tests the strength, length and sensitivity of the pelvic floor. This may sound simple, but it relays a great deal of information about a patient’s body and issues she might be experiencing.
