Manual Lymphatic Drainage, methods compared

day of intercultural training, Lymphatic Drainage Manual of the two most famous schools of the method, the Emil Vodder school and the Albert Leduc school met today at our DLM technical center.

In the style of the Swiss Intercultural Health & Educatin Center

they took part in today's training

for the Vodder method Dr. Federica Zizzo 🇮🇹 and the complementary therapist Dipl. Annalise Crivelli 🇨🇭

for the Leduc method the massage therapies Dipl. Odm International Oana Cristina Dutu 🇷🇴 and Biserka Stojic 🇷🇸

Manual lymphatic drainage accelerates the healing process and at the same time removes the liquid that causes the edema and any pathogens or other foreign bodies

The school

Lymphatic drainage is performed mainly according to the dictates of two schools. Both lymphatic drainage schools are based on the same principles: the main difference between the two lies in the type of movement used. Emil Vodder was the first to study its characteristics, but Albert Leduc, a professor of motor rehabilitation at the University of Brussels and founder of the European Lymphology Group, has the merit of having perfected the technique and studied the effect on an experimental basis. with formal limits and on restricted samples

Emil Vodder

The lymph drainage of Vodder is a sequence that has as a mandatory characteristic the "opening" on the neck of some points like profundus and terminus, corresponding to lymph nodes, thoracic duct and the great lymphatic vein with the consequent emptying. The opening consists of a combination of circular movements - round or oval, performed with a pressure of about 40 gr. therefore superficial that push the skin, without crawling over it. After that, a body district to be massaged is chosen (upper limbs, lower limbs, etc.) as the Vodder method cannot be applied to the whole body in the same session. If I go to work on the lower limb I will continue with the groin discharge and then I will treat the thigh. Furthermore, the softer the fabric, the lighter the massage

lbert Leduc

The Leduc technique is based on a more limited number of maneuvers, and proposes a series of treatment protocols based on the type of disorder. The bandage of the edematous limb is an integral part of the cure: it should not be compressive and should be applied from the periphery towards the center. Leduc emphasizes the need to adapt manual drainage to the particular case: the principles must serve only as a guiding thread. The only rule that should never be broken is the delicacy of the maneuver

The effects

The fields in which Manual Lymphatic Drainage is used are both medical and aesthetic. The beneficial effects of DLM are indeed many and to date not all its potential has been discovered and exploited. The main indications are the antiedematous effect, in fact it favors the lymphatic circulation, increasing its speed of flow, thus allowing the reduction of the edema, both lymphatic and of other origin, as can occur in the premenstrual period, in women in pregnancy, after having undergone removal of the saphenous vein, after performing sclerosing procedures on the varicose veins or following mastectomy interventions. Also useful for eliminating oedemas that form after a plastic and aesthetic surgery, here the ideal would be to perform treatments both before and after the operation

Contraindications

There are two types of contraindications in the treatment of manual lymph drainage: absolute and relative.

Absolute contraindications are: acute infections, tuberculosis, established or suspected malignant tumors.

Relative contraindications are: renal insufficiency, heart failure, asthma, hyperthyroidism, vagotonia.