History of Juvinile Rhuemetiod Arthitis

[Jan S]

I recently saw a female in her early-mid twenties. She said she had Juvinile Rhuemetoid Arthrititis as a child, but outgrew it with puberty. She said the only remaining affect that she notices is that her left knee is stiff and gives her some pain sometimes. The main focus of the session was doing Myofascial Release (John Barnes method) hip stretches and I noticed something interesting. Her muscles felt pretty pliable, she's fit and exercises regularly and said she does some stretching, but she said she knows she doesn't stretch enough. Anyway, while doing the passive stretches on her, the range of motion in her hips felt pretty limited- it was like i sensed that her muscles could stretch a lot more, but her fascia was saying no way and pushing back at me. I did instruct her on breathing into the area of tension cause I thought it might be a sub-conscious thing, but she seemed very relaxed and even dozed off a couple times. Her hips seemed pretty level, shoulders pretty balanced, her feet rested pretty nuetral. I did internal & external leg rotation and felt quite a bit of releasing before starting the other stretches. She says she wants to come back as much as she can, but she's a college student and may not be able to come too often. I gave her a hand-out to take with her of hip/low back stretches, that includes quad stretch & psoas, I think if she sticks with those it could help take some tension off of her knee. Last time I saw her I did a transverse release directly to her knee and she said it didn't hurt for about two weeks after that session.Anyway, does anyone have any suggestions for working with this client?