about us

Developed in 1995 by physiotherapist Anna-Louise Bouvier the program has been designed to combine the most cutting edge scientific research related to back pain with the motivation and fun a class environment can create. Our physiotherapists excel in delivering complex medical information in a simple and digestible way.

The road to recovery from back pain is often lined with a plethora of solutions and advice, some of which may be conflicting. Our aim is to sort through this maze of information to provide you with a logical framework which helps you “make sense” of the story of your pain.

It fuses philosophies from western science diagnosis and research on anatomy, pain and functional retraining, to the eastern practices of holistic integration and wellness philosophy. There are elements of the stretching and alignment of yoga, the core stability of pilates, the breathing of the east, the control of tai chi but there is much much more.

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Physiocise is about looking at your whole body not just the bit that has pain. We aim to rebuild your back, your posture and your body from your brain to your bottom and beyond. The program brings together a myriad of different philosophies and research and puts them into a framework that you, the client, can understand.

We aim to understand the big picture. Any kind of body pain will always affect some other area of your body. The old “knee bone connected to the thigh bone” adage is very true. So we do an integrated assessment of your whole body not just the area that is giving you problems…because chances are the real solution is much more complex than it looks at first…and that is probably why traditional hands-on treatment has not had any lasting affect.

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different bodies need different emphasis

This is the most unique element of Physiocise. Anna-Louise developed this category system after many years of working with clients with back pain. One size does not fit all when it comes to fixing bodies. We will teach you what kind of body you were born with and how that affects which exercises are most important for you.

Our Level 1 program gives you the basics of our program. These are the essentials that every person needs to rebuild their body. However, once you have the basics one size does not fit all when it comes to a long term fix. Different bodies need different emphasis in retraining. Much of this comes down to what your inherent flexibility is like. Some bodies need lots of flexibility; others need lots of control and support. We have developed the category system of Floppies, Stiffies and Flippies to help put you in the most appropriate class for your type of body.

So if you are the sort of person who could do the splits as a child; have always been flexible; have always had clicky joints and find it difficult to sit still, you will find a whole class full of people who are just like you in one of our specialty Floppy classes.

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The term evidence based medicine means that the treatment or advice that is given to you is based on solid research evidence. This has become a major aim of medicine and physiotherapy over the last 10 years and is our focus at Physiocise.

Our aim is to deliver the most up to date research on back and body pain in the most digestable and accessible way. To keep up to date, our team keeps involved in extensive postgraduate study. We meet as a group 4 times a year, to workshop the latest research and decide how to integrate it into classes. We also attend national medical conferences and workshops. In Barcelona in November 2007, company director, Anna-Louise Bouvier will be one of the keynote speakers at the International Multidisciplinary World Low Back Pain Congress.

Many of our staff also lecture and present at national conferences and workshops about exercise therapy. We also keep up to date with international research through our subscriptions to the most relevant medical and physiotherapy research journals.