When illusionist Kevin Spencer was 5, he saw his first magic performance on television and told his mother someday he would become a magician. What he didn’t know at the time was he eventually would use those skills to teach physical and occupational therapists how to serve their clients better.
When Spencer was in college majoring in psychology, he attended a performance by the late Doug Henning and was lucky enough to meet him backstage after the show. "He gave me three pieces of advice," Spencer said. "One, take acting lessons, because you need to be able to effectively communicate with an audience. Two, take dance lessons, so you can move onstage in a way that will make the audience feel comfortable. And three, always be yourself." Armed with that knowledge, Spencer embarked on a career as a full-time magician.
But then came an unforeseen turning point.
Accidental transformation
While idling at a stoplight, Spencer was rear-ended by a semitrailer. "I woke up in neurological intensive care with a closed brain injury and a lower spinal cord injury and spent the next year of my life in PT and OT. So my work with therapists arose out of a very first-hand experience, and I think it gives me a real empathy for what they and their clients go through."
In his months of rehab, Spencer discovered what most physical therapy patients already know: Long-term therapy can get pretty tedious. He thought he might be able to help make the process more engaging, and his wife, Cindy, who also is his assistant onstage, agreed. "Kevin and I talked about using magic tricks in therapy while he was going through his own regimen," she said. "We both knew there had to be a more effective and motivating way to get people more involved in their treatment."
When Spencer’s course of therapy finally concluded, he sat down with the head of the rehab department at the hospital and suggested teaching patients magic tricks might help them stay engaged in their therapy regimens. The two "started to dissect the movements and skills that were required to perform these tricks, and the ones we came up with each focus on a very specific goal," Spencer said.
With the help of physical and occupational therapists, before long Spencer had cobbled together a treatment program that included some 50 tricks, dubbed Healing of Magic.
"The motivation to learn the trick becomes very high, because at the end of the day, you get to show someone what you’ve learned," Spencer said.
With the knowledge that most clinics and hospitals are watching their budgets closely, Spencer developed a program using common items such as rubber bands, paper clips, dollar bills and pieces of rope. In a hospital setting, he often uses lengths of Thera-Bands, which offer varying amounts of resistance depending on the patient’s level of strength.
One of Spencer’s favorite tricks involves folding a dollar bill partway and putting paper clips on it so they’re on opposite sides of the bill but don’t touch. When the clients pull the ends of the bill, the paper clips jump up and link together. "It’s about planning, organizing and movement, strengthening and grading of the hand and arm, and balance and motor control," Spencer said. "In just this one little trick, there’s so much therapeutic value for the client. But they’re not thinking about that — they’re just trying to get those paper clips in the air and make them link."
Spencer said tricks also can be used by therapists to develop clients’ ability to grasp, pinch, release and follow complicated directions.
Spencer initially developed the program as an adjunct professor in the occupational therapy department at the University of Alabama, Birmingham. But soon discovered it could be valuable to physical and even speech therapists. He now teaches a continuing education PT/OT workshop, mostly in the cities where he performs, but occasionally he is called upon to teach the class elsewhere. (Schedules can be found at spencersmagic.com/showdates.)
Creating believers
When Judy Lipofsky, PT, clinical manager of pediatric therapy at Martin Memorial Health System’s rehabilitation site in Jensen Beach, Fla., first heard about it, she thought the idea was "a little weird."
"Physical therapists are used to therapy being a bit more straightforward," she said. "But we’re also always willing to look at new and exciting ways of helping clients."
Lipofsky took Spencer’s four-hour course, learning tricks she later would use with her young charges. "And they loved it," she said. "So many of the kids we see have low self-esteem because they may have poor coordination and balance or muscle weakness. Besides helping them with their treatment, the magic was something they could learn and be proud of, and then show it off to their friends or parents."
Rebecca Phillips, OTR, CHT, CLCP, administrative director of rehab at Martin Memorial, said, "I’ve been a therapist for 30 years, and I’d never heard of anyone using magic tricks as a tool for rehab. But the more I learned about it, the more value I saw in it. We brought Kevin and his staff in to work with our pediatric therapists and our clients’ parents, and they did a great, great job. It was amazing."
Spencer also has developed a special education course called Hocus Focus (hocusfocuseducation.com) for children who have special needs. "He knew how motivating learning magic was for clients and felt that kids could benefit as well," Cindy Spencer said. "So he developed an 11-week course for students with special learning needs, and has spoken about it at so many international education conferences that I’ve lost count. I’m so proud of the work that he is doing in medicine and education."
For his part, Spencer said he feels he’s just doing what he was meant to do. "It’s the most incredible feeling for me to know that something I do as an art form has the ability to impact the quality of someone’s life," he said. "I wouldn’t be where I am today without the very dedicated therapists who worked with me through my recovery. So I feel this tremendous responsibility to give back to them, to give them these tools, so that they can go back and change the lives of other clients the way they changed mine."
(Source: news.todayinpt.com)
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