Experience & Background
I completed my first degree, a Bachelor of Physiotherapy from the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, in 1987. I was invited to continue my studies and completed a post-graduate Honors degrees in 1988. I was extremely fortunate at that time to study under the late Professor Vladimir Janda. His observations regarding muscle imbalances, faulty posture and gait patterns, and their association with chronic pain syndromes, has been a profound influence on my career.
After working in various cities and specialist areas within the public hospital system in Queensland, I moved to Newcastle, near Sydney and started my private practice career. I worked extensively with work related injuries and sporting injuries and also provided physiotherapy for the Newcastle National Basketball League (NBL) team, The Falcons. I then moved to Darwin, “the top end” of Australia in 1992 where I continued working in private practice as well as treating members of the armed forces and also expanding my treatment modalities to include hydrotherapy.
In 1993, after the obligatory year of back packing around Europe I worked in Saudi Arabia in a hospital where I had the opportunity to use state of the art strengthening equipment usually only found in University research departments. I spent a wonderful year working with the conservative, pre and post-operative management of ACL knee joint rehabilitation.
I arrived in Hong Kong in 1994 starting work in general private practice before completing my Pilates training in 1996. Over the ensuing years I have attended a large variety of different Pilates courses around the world while also training hundreds of Physiotherapists in the Biokinetic Exercise Technique (B.E.T) a Hong Kong grown Pilates training programme for Physiotherapists.
After working as the research assistant on a Pilates research project at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, I was inspired to return to academia and commenced my own a research Master’s of Philosophy degree at the HKPU. I spent 2 years full time researching my thesis which investigated three dimensional movements of the neck, shoulder and scapulae.Using my many years of experience, 34 years and counting, as well as over 26 years of Pilates experience, I have formulated my own training programme for Physiotherapists called Pilates Plus. I focus on assessment of both static and dynamic postures and after retraining basic muscle and movement patterns I utilize the Pilates equipment to challenge and improve how people move in order to prevent or change postural dysfunctions which contribute to pain, discomfort or stiffness.
I have always worked closely with personal trainers in order to continue the safe post-rehabilitation strengthening of my clients. This has led me to my latest area of clinical treatment – targeted and specific strengthening for bone density.
