 | The International Spine and Pain Institute story starts in South Africa, with its founder – Adriaan Louw. Adriaan was born and raised in South Africa as part of a middle-class family and was the first and only member of his family to attend university, thanks mainly to a hard work discipline, instilled by both his parents and social environment. After toying with the idea of going to medical school, Adriaan was persuaded by a counselor to “combine” his love of sport and medicine and become a physiotherapist. At first Adriaan did not get accepted into the stringent physiotherapy programs, but after one year of completing basic sciences, he showed instructors he was able to handle the rigors of a university environment | and was finally accepted into the physiotherapy program at the illustrious University of Stellenbosch in Cape Town, South Africa. Adriaan’s training was based on the Australian-Maitland approach of clinical reasoning and encompassed a stringent and thorough training in manual therapy, which was not only taught in class, but supervised daily by clinical instructors and faculty in seeing and treating large patient loads. During his final year, Adriaan became extremely drawn to manual therapy, mainly due to personal help from two highly skilled faculty – Ms. Marietta Uys and Mrs. Lynette Crous.
| Adriaan graduated from physiotherapy school in 1992 and started working immediately in an outpatient hospital setting at a local government hospital, seeing all kinds of spinal and peripheral joint injuries. He enjoyed working within in that environment very much. He had direct access and the ability to send patients over to radiology for x-rays. Physiotherapy in South Africa is a direct access profession and training was based heavily on diagnosis.
|  | Adriaan was lured to the United States in 1994. In his final year at physiotherapy school, US recruiting companies came to South Africa and enticed therapists to sign on to contracts to work in the US due to a physical therapy shortage. For Adriaan it was a huge opportunity. Never in his upbringing could he have ever imagined the chance of coming to the US. Here was an opportunity of a lifetime, to see the US and “make some money.” Eighteen months after starting all the paperwork, Adriaan was heading to America. Having never been on an airplane, Adriaan boarded a 15-hour flight to the US in May of 1994, with 2 bags of belongings and $400 in his pocket.
| Adriaan was recruited by Research Medical Center in Kansas City, MO. He worked primarily in inpatient orthopedics for a while and was soon after moved to Research Belton Hospital, where he started his outpatient orthopedic career in the US. It is also at Research Belton Hospital that Adriaan met the future Mrs. Louw and the biggest influence on his career and driving force behind the development of International Spine and Pain Institute – Colleen. Colleen, an Iowa native, had just graduated from Rockhurst University and had an incredible yearn to learn more about manual therapy after early exposure and influence by the Canadians, headed by Jim Meadows. Colleen loved manual therapy and after being exposed to the Maitland approach and new exciting world of hands-on care, diagnosis and clinical reasoning, contacted Rockhurst University and set up Adriaan’s first teaching opportunity – an elective on manual therapy for final year students, which Adriaan still teaches today.
|  | Soon after teaching at Rockhurst, Adriaan’s employer became aware of his skills and teaching ability and asked him to present the same spinal courses throughout the health system. It was at these courses that Colleen and Adriaan encountered their first assistant, Sherri Gentry, a fellow therapist, with a passion for manual therapy. It was soon after this that the proverbial “knights of the round table” met.
There was a definite need and demand for manual therapy - teaching therapists skills of clinically reasoning, diagnosis, hands-on treatment and creating better outcomes. This initial group had an energy and message they wanted to spread. In early 1997, four people gathered around a kitchen table to start a seminar company, dedicated to help therapists, one-by-one. Their goal was to help physical therapists become the best out-patient | therapist they could be and enjoy the profession they chose. Adriaan Louw, Colleen Henry, Sherri Gentry and Brian Freund, a former student and co-worker of Adriaan’s, decided to form a company – hoping to span the Midwest - Midwest Spine Therapists, LLC (MST). MST started small, slowly expanding to hospitals and clinics in and around the Kansas City area. Eventually MST started growing and spreading to neighboring states and eventually nationwide - all based on word-of-mouth marketing by inspired therapists, it's main source of referrals, even today. The philosophy was, and still is, to create and implement the best courses possible, along with keeping updated with the best and latest material, helping therapists with real life clinical issues and giving them a boost to “feel good” about their choice of profession. Bottom line: This group loved the field they were in, what it stood for and a bigger mission – to enable the patient recover more efficiently and effectively through physical therapy intervention.
|  | During the late 1990’s, Adriaan was influenced by two key people, instrumental in the product of MST – David Butler and Dr. Lance Twomey. Adriaan attended some lectures and cadaver dissection courses with Dr. Lance Twomey on clinical anatomy and pathology of the spine and it has since heavily influenced our teaching methods and messages. Around the same time, Adriaan attended a course with David Butler, who brought to him the exciting world of pain science, neural tissue mobilization and manual therapy together. Adriaan believed in the message so much he became an instructor with David’s group – the Neuro Orthopedic Institute (NOI), where he still teaches today with David Butler, whom has become probably his most influential mentor and continues to challenge Adriaan's way of thinking and how he treats patients.
| In 1999 MST also had the incredible urge to keep in touch with the working therapists – informing them about new research; letting them know about courses and new developments at MST. MST decided to launch a simple black and white paper newsletter, which has since evolved into one of it's icons – the red, white and gray newsletter, jam-packed with research and happenings, which is still going strong today.
|  | MST was growing and expanding all over the US and encountered one of its most important landmarks in 2004 in Phoenix, AZ. Adriaan was once again running around the class, showing pictures of deadly African animals and begging people to believe in this wonderful profession at the Arizona Physical Therapy Association Conference, when he spotted a very serious-looking and stoic therapist in the front row, who later would introduce himself as Emilio “Louie” Puentedura – a physiotherapists from Australia, trained by Geoff Maitland, and now working in Yuma, AZ. Louie was a perfect fit, and became the next instructor at MST. | | Combining intellectual material, Adriaan and Louie were soon traveling and teaching courses all over the US. MST finally outgrew its name. In 2005, MST changed its name and took on a bigger, global issue of spinal pain, education and pain science, furthering the message of the Neuro Orthopedica Institute-Australia (NOI). MST became the International Spine and Pain Institute (ISPI) - the same company formed around the kitchen table, but with bigger, loftier goals, based on the utter belief that physical therapy is the neuromusculoskeletal specialty field in the health care arena, and is the best health profession to treat and teach the patient about how to manage their pain. | | | In 2006 ISPI launched its certification program. The goal has always been to have therapists complete a thorough and systematic process of training in spinal manual therapy, and be able to reward them accordingly. ISPI worked on the development of a certification process and carved it out of 7 "core" manual therapy courses plus an elective, a written and lab test, and case study. Additionally, ISPI also added significant ISPI faculty as well as an international faculty whose courses added to the electives list - David Butler, Mark Jones and Lorimer Moseley - all from Australia.
| In May 2006, ISPI took another step forward in the field of orthopedic manual therapy - adding a physician to its faculty. Dr. Lan Fotopoulos, MD - an interventional physiatrist, added a new dimension to the ISPI courses, including radiology, pharmacology, diagnosis and medical management of spinal disorders. The addition of Dr. Fotopoulos, MD, also prepared ISPI for its next mission: Educating physicians about the benefits of physical therapy. ISPI truly believes that by changing the mindset of physicians, it can/will change the perception and place of the physical therapy profession in the health care world. Another component ISPI added to their services were the development of evening series. Launched in Kansas City in the fall of 2004, these series have grown and are presented in other cities such as St. Louis, MO, Springfield, MO, Lincoln, NE, Boise, ID, and Des Moines, IA. These heavily attended evening lectures have become very popular to physical therapists as they are educational, resourceful, conveninent, and fun! Both physicians and experienced physical therapists combine lectures to make these a well-rounded, interacitve educational event. At the end of 2009, after 2 years in the making, ISPI decided to launch a "sister" company committed to home studies, since between the evening lectures and so much information to share from other courses, ISPI decided this would be another great way to spread research-based, updated information in another format. Orthospineandpain.com was created to fill another need for the busy physical therapist looking for high-quality CEU's in a more convenient format. Presently, in 2010, ISPI is still presenting high quality continuing education nationally and internationally for physical therapists and continues to grow. Adriaan and Louie are both working on completing their PhD's relating to spinal and pain research, adding more even dimensions to the profession and finding ways to better treat the physical therapy patient. During these exciting times, ISPI's instructors continue to present at local, state, national, and international conferences. ISPI fully remains committed to promoting, enhancing, and energizing the physical therapy profession, and looks forward to seeing it become an even stronger entity in the world of health care. |
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