Despite advances in medicine, increased access to healthcare, and improved surgical strategies, quality of life for adult and geriatric populations has been reduced as quantity and productivity have taken priority over quality and individuality. Regardless of clinical setting, clinicians are asked to magically improve quality of life with reduced funding, reduced time, and increased documentation standards.
How can I improve quality of life and participation in meaningful activity while meeting the demands of physicians, employers, and patients? How can I effectively evaluate and provide treatment strategies addressing stability, mobility, falls, confidence, gait, and mobility with my clients in their specific environment?
If these questions are difficult for you to answer, then this innovative, evidence-based course is for you. You’ll learn new perspectives, at least a dozen assessment tools that provide objective data, and over 50 treatment strategies. And…you’ll be engaged and energized.
Trent’s course manual is referred to as a picture book because it includes pictures of deficits, pictures of research results that address the problem (actual pictures, not just words), and then pictures of a therapist using assessments and interventions while working with a patient. Participants LOVE the picture book, and many have told Trent that they attend his course because they’ve seen their colleagues’ picture book.
This course is based on an evolutionary pattern approach in which clinicians are trained to adjust or evolve treatment plans depending on how each individual is responding that day and that minute. You can’t treat all patients, or even all patients dealing with the same deficits, the same way. You must be engaged, contain the skillset, and willing to change your approach depending on what you see in your patient moment to moment.
This course addresses three major areas:
- Re-defining the core using principles of stability and mobility
Through evidence-based approaches and labs, participants will master movements for stability in all functional planes while re-defining the core in a way that emphasizes individual patient performance. These strategies can be modified for all functional levels. The course will also address dysfunctional posture and contracture development commonly seen with older adults, and participants will learn specific strategies to reduce, remove, or delay these patterns.
- Fall reduction strategies
Attention will be given to stability and mobility principles as well as external factors, medication management, depression, Hypovitaminosis, vision, and psychological factors often neglected in everyday practice. In addition, we will review what works and what doesn’t work in fall reduction based on the latest evidence.
- The “Determinants of Gait” and how they impact function, mobility, and quality of life.
This course will dive into the history of mobility and what is often neglected when we focus solely on physical “phases of gait”. The instructor will provide in-depth analysis on the 6 determinants of gait and reducing energy expenditure using the latest evidence and how to address the 6 determinants increasing function and mobility beyond “gait”.
Trent Brown’s background is unique, which is why he looks at the human body and activities in a different way than most therapists. He was a gymnast, a diver, and an acrobat. These experiences have helped him learn to take a complicated task and break it down for a 9-year-old or a 90-year-old. If you’re looking for fresh ideas and innovative thinking, this course is for you.
And while we’re at it, why not learn how to bill and document the specific strategies learned in the course in a way that meets the requirement of all payor types. Trent will walk you through specific examples of how to document the interventions in a way that turns documentation into a benefit, not a hindrance.
Day 1
9:00am – “CORE” TRENDS AND RESEARCH
- The impact of aging, lifestyle/bedrest & lack of core emphasis
- Pyramid (order) of Core Contraction and Spinal Stability
- Where is all the evidence and where does it miss the mark?
9:45am – DEFINITION(S) OF THE CORE
- Superior/Central/Inferior core (re-defining the core)
- Core disassociation and dissemination
- Stabilizers vs. Mobilizers (which is more important)
10:30am – EVIDENCE–BASED CORE/EXERCISE PRINCIPLES
- CRAC theory, Exercise Dosage, Motor Unit Recruitment, Reciprocal Innervation, Muscle Fiber Type (I-IIA-IIX-IIB)
11:00am – BREAK
11:15am – STANDARDIZED CORE TESTING
- Hand Held Dynamometry
- Trunk Impairment Scale (TIS) (homework)
- Posture Assessment Scale for Stroke-Trunk Control (PASS-TC) (homework)
- BKFO, Sidelying SLR
- Three-Plane Core Test (practice)
12:00pm – SUPINE STABILITY
- Imprinting/Abdominal Ball Press (sagittal plane) (LAB/Practice)
- Trochanter Tension (frontal Plane) (homework)
- Supine Toby Twister and Isometric Log Roll (transverse plane) (homework)
1:00pm – WORKING LUNCH (on your own) Case Study
1:30pm – SEATED STABILITY
- Dolphin (dissemination modified side plank)
- Seated Toby Twister
- Stable Reaction Ball Drop (single-multi-planer)
3:00pm – STANDING STABILITY
- Modified Standing Plank (core dissemination) (practice)
- Modified Codman Plank (pre-gait)
- Standing Toby Twister
- Stable Reaction Ball Drop (single multi-planer)
3:45pm – SUPINE MOBILITY
- ASIS/PSIS Press (manual single-planer joint mob) (homework)
- Superior Scapular Elevation (practice)
4:30pm – BREAK
4:45pm – SEATED MOBILITY
- Quad sit-up (closed chain/WB emphasis) (practice)
- Lateral Reach
- Toby Twister
- Mobile Reaction Ball Drop (single multi-planer)
5:45pm – STANDING MOBILITY
- Flex/Ext with Pelvic Resistance (homework)
- Dynamic Lateral Side Bend
- PNF Pattern Transport
- Mobile Reaction Ball Drop (single multi-planer)
6:15pm – FUNCTIONAL IMPLICATION (APPLIED PRACTICE)
6:45pm – CASE STUDY, QUESTIONS & DOCUMENTATION
7:00pm – ADJOURN
Day 2
9:00am – DEMOGRAPHICS, STATS, AND COST
- The Where and Why
9:30am – COMMON FALL ASSOCIATION AND UNCOMMON TREATMENT
- Fall Preventatives
- Fear and Stiffening Strategy
- Soleuostretch (practice)
- Eye Movement Behaviors
- Visual Stance and Glance (homework)
- Plantar Flexion and Mobility
- Gastroclock (practice)
- Visual Impairment, Medication and Mechanism, Depression and SSRI’s
- Hip Flexor Contraction – Male vs. Female Falling
- Functional Iliopsoas Lengthening and Mobility (homework)
- Vitamin D Deficiency (the increasing correlation)
11:30am – BREAK
11:45am – THE CLINICIANS ROLE IN FALL PREVENTION
- Education: Sleep, Adaptive Equipment (training and set-up)
- Fall Reduction Programs: What Works (OTAGO)
12:30pm – BEST PRACTICE
- Fall Risk Assessment/Evaluation (FRT, 4-Test, CDC Algorithm)
- TUG vs TUG Manual and Dual Task Cost
- Static vs. Dynamic PNF Chops
- NDT Single Leg WB
12:45am – CASE STUDY, QUESTIONS & DOCUMENTATION
1:00pm – WORKING LUNCH (on your own) Review/Discuss Standardized Gait Assessments
1:30pm – WHY WE WALK THE WAY WE DO
- Saunders vs. Rancho Los Amigos
- Metabolic landscape – Curtate Cycloid – Energy Expenditure and COM
2:30pm – WHERE “PHASES OF GAIT” MISS THE MARK
- Pedunculopontine Nucleus and Mobility
- Parameters for clinical examination of mobility
2:45pm – 6 DETERMINANTS OF GAIT (INCLUDING CURRENT RESEARCH FOR EACH)
- Sit-Stand (anterior/posterior pelvic tilt)
- Pelvic Teeter Totter (homework)
- Lateral Pelvic Tilt (7 degrees)
- Glut Med Response Activity (most effective)
- Seated Walking
- Knee Flexion at Midstance (8 degrees)
- Half-stand Stabilizers (homework)
- Knee/Ankle/Foot Interactions
- Insoles, Re-visit Gastroclock/Soleustretch
4:15pm – BREAK
4:30pm – 6 DETERMINANTS OF GAIT (Continued)
- Pelvic Rotation with Hip Flexion
- Dynamic Rotation (seated/half-stand)
- AAROM Hip Flexion (seated walking)
- Reciprocal Arm Swing
- Seated/Standing UE Swing (with/without resistance) (practice)
6:00pm – STANDARDIZED EVALUATIONS/ASSESSMENTS (WHAT WORKS?)
- 10 Meter, FGA
6:15pm – CASE STUDY, QUESTIONS & DOCUMENTATION
7:00pm – ADJOURN
Upon completion of this seminar, participants will be able to:
- Analyze the dysfunctional posture, gait, and functional mobility that can occur with contracture, weakness, and disuse of core anatomy.
- Explain functional movement patterns in all anatomical planes based on patient posture, positioning, and aging.
- Develop comprehensive, evidence-based treatment plans to improve stability and mobility in all planes through labs.
- Review core-based activities based on research and current evidence to promote independence with sit/stand, transfers, ADL’s, and dynamic standing tasks.
- Demonstrate stability and dynamic based core treatment strategies during labs to develop an evolutionary plan of care and to promote functional outcome.
- Identify the major contributors to falls, the most common environments where falls occur, the importance of core stability, and the role of clinicians in fall reduction for the adult and geriatric population.
- Design exercises, assessments, fall reduction programs, and educational evidence-based resources appropriate for clinical application to reduce falls.
- Compare and Contrast the 6 Determinants of gait, how they impact the phases of gait, and how they reduce energy expenditure during gait.
- Master exercises, activities, and manual treatment strategies to improve each of the 6 determinants of gait in lecture and labs.
- Administer standardized gait and mobility assessments and which utilize the strategies learned in this course.
EDUCATIONAL CREDIT: A certificate of attendance for 20 contact hours of educational activity (20 CEUs or 2.0 CEUs depending on how your Practice Act determines CEUs in your state) will be awarded to registrants upon completion of the seminar.
Physical Therapy: Great Seminars and Books is an Approved CE Provider for PTs and PTAs in NY, IL, CA, TX, and NM and this course provides 20 contact hours of continuing education. This course is approved for PTs/PTAs in MD. Have applied for approval in NJ, LA, FL, MS, OH. Our courses also meet the guidelines for approval in AL, AK, AZ, CT, DC, DE, GA, HI, ID, IA, IN, KS, KY, MA, MI, MO, MS, MT, NE, NH, NC, ND, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, UT, VT, VA, WA, WI, WY.
Occupational Therapy: Great Seminars and Books is an AOTA Approved Provider of professional development. Course approval ID# 13566. This live, distance learning (interactive), and distance learning (independent) course is offered at 2.0 CEUs, intermediate educational level, for categories of OT Service Delivery and Foundational Knowledge. The assignment of AOTA CEUs does not imply endorsement of specific course content, products, or clinical procedures by AOTA. Effective 9/20/25 to 9/20/30. Please verify if your state accepts AOTA approval of continuing education courses.
Your tuition may be tax deductible. Any reference to or mention of state rules or regulations concerning continuing education requirements are true and accurate to the best of our knowledge at the time of print. If you have questions, please contact your board or regulating body.
If you do not see your state listed, please give our office a call at 877 794 7328.
WEBINAR
A webinar is live, interactive video course delivered over the Internet to your computer. You will be able to see, hear and interact with the course presenter. This live, webinar will utilize live instruction, demonstrative videos, power point slides and more. You will have an opportunity to ask questions during the seminar. A comprehensive handout will be made available to you after you register for the webinar. In many courses, demonstrative video will be used to further enhance your learning experience. All written content used in the presentation will also be made available to you for your personal use (Power Point Slides, Reference Materials etc.).
Financial Disclosure: Trent Brown, MOT, OTR/L, ATP, CFPS, CGCP, BCG, is a lecturer for GREAT Seminars. He receives payment from GREAT Seminars for the presentation of this course.
Nonfinancial Disclosure: No relevant nonfinancial relationship exists.
Content Disclosure: This course does not focus solely on any specific product or service.
Both Days - 20 contact hours
April 18-19, 2026 - $445.00
Day 1 Only - 10 contact hours
April 18, 2026 - $225.00
Day 2 Only - 10 contact hours
April 19, 2026 - $225.00
A post-test will be given at the end of Day 1 for the Day 1 materials and a Post-Test will be given on Day 2 for the Day 2 materials. A post-test score of 70% or more is considered passing. Scores of less than 70% indicate a failure to understand the material and the test will need to be taken again until a passing score has been achieved. For each day attended, you will receive a certificate of completion for 10 contact hours. If you attend both days of the Live Webinar, you will receive a total of 20 contact hours.