The idea that therapists could use slings and suspensions for patients within a ‘sling cage’ derives from a lecture Lord Horder gave to the Chartered Society of Massage and Medical Gymnastics (later the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy) in London in 1927. In the talk, Horder argued that
No amount of massage and no amount of electrical stimulation of whatever kind has the same physiological value as the natural movement carried out by the patient under supervision and careful guidance.
This idea led UK physiotherapist Olive Guthrie Smith to develop her suspension system that used a combination of springs, slings, and pulleys, attached to ‘portable gymnasium’ that could be used over the patient’s bed on the ward, or in the physiotherapy department.
By carefully placing the whole patient, or just the affected body in the system, the effects of gravity and graduated spring resistance, could be used to retrain movement. Adjusting the angle of the resistance could simulate the buoyancy of water or the resistance of a weights machine. Critically, once set up, the patient could do the work on their own, freeing the physiotherapist up to work with other patients.
The suspension system because hugely popular, and was used to treat a wide range of conditions, from fractures and low-back pain to bronchiectasis and spastic paralysis, and continued to be used well into the latter half of the 20th century.
Description provided by Dave Nicholls of New Zealand.
References:
Guthrie-Smith OF. 1943. Rehabilitation, Re-education and Remedial Exercise. London: Bailliere, Tindall & Cox.
Hollis M, Roper MHS. 1965. Suspension therapy in rehabilitation. London: Bailliere, Tindall and Cassell.
