What We Treat

Parkinson’s treatment in University Heights.

Steps that got shorter without you ever deciding to shorten them. An arm that stopped swinging. A foot that sticks in the doorway. Parkinson’s makes movement smaller, quietly. The work here is making it bigger again, on purpose.

LSVT BIG certified Shuffling and freezing Balance and falls Schedule Appointment

Sound Familiar?

Does this sound like your day?

  • Your handwriting got smaller, and someone else noticed before you did
  • One arm stopped swinging when you walk, and you can’t make it start again
  • Your feet stick to the floor in a doorway, right when you need them most
  • Steps that shorten into a shuffle by the end of the hallway
  • Turning around now takes four small steps where it used to take one
  • Getting out of a low chair takes a count of three and a rock forward

Any of these? Every one of them is something we train. Keep reading.

Why It Happens

Parkinson’s makes movement smaller. Then it makes small feel normal.

Parkinson’s changes how the brain scales a movement. The instruction to move still arrives. The size setting on it drifts down. So a full step becomes a short step, a full arm swing becomes almost none, and a signature shrinks to half a line. Rigidity stiffens the middle of the body, which takes the turn and the arm swing with it.

The hard part is the calibration. Small movement starts to feel normal-sized from the inside, so you stop correcting it. Muscles shorten, balance reactions get slower, and the shuffle feeds itself. That is what amplitude training is built for. It resets what big feels like, then rehearses it until it holds up in doorways and on curbs. Marjorie Kerestesy, PTA, is LSVT BIG certified and NDT trained, and that is the work she does here.

Physical therapist coaching a patient through large-amplitude stepping and reaching practice for Parkinson’s

The Honest Truth

Smaller movement is a habit. Habits set.

If you keep waiting

  • Movement keeps shrinking, and the smaller version keeps feeling normal from the inside
  • Balance reactions get slower from lack of practice, on top of everything else
  • The list of places you’ll walk without holding onto something keeps getting shorter

If you start this week

  • You find out exactly where gait and balance are breaking down, in plain terms
  • You practice big on purpose, at an amplitude a therapist sets and watches
  • You get a plan with an endpoint, plus home practice that holds what you gain

You’ve spent a lifetime being the capable one. So you adjusted quietly instead of asking anybody for help. That’s exactly why this is worth one visit.

How We Fix It

Four phases. Built around amplitude.

Every plan has an endpoint. Here’s what the four phases look like when the target is bigger, steadier movement.

Weeks 1–2

Pain

Get the stiffness out of the way.

Rigidity and a locked-up trunk make every movement smaller. Hands-on work and gentle mobility settle that first, so bigger movement has somewhere to go.

Weeks 2–6

Prime

Reset what big feels like.

Large-amplitude drills, cued out loud and repeated, retrain the size of a movement until your own sense of normal moves with it.

Weeks 6–10

Perform

Take it into walking and turning.

Longer steps, a real arm swing, turns broken into a safer sequence, and balance work aimed at the reactions that catch you.

Weeks 10+

Prevent

Make it carry over.

Doorways, curbs, the kitchen, standing up out of your own chair. We rehearse the actual moments, then hand you the home practice that keeps them.

Very professional, well liked by anyone who said they went to In Motion Physical Therapy

Shared by Chaim F. · Parkinson’s

Very professional

well liked by anyone who said they went to In Motion Physical Therapy

Parkinson’s and balance Chaim F.

Related Conditions

Movement problems rarely travel alone.

Balance, stiffness and dizziness tend to show up together. Here’s what else we treat.

1

Dizziness & Vertigo

The room tilting when you roll over, and the caution that follows you all day.

Learn More 2

Joint Pain

Stiffness that needs a warm-up before your body agrees to cooperate.

Learn More 3

Chronic Pain

Years of “just live with it” from people who never looked for the actual cause.

Learn More

Questions, Answered

What people ask before booking for Parkinson’s.

No. Amplitude training has been studied in people at a wide range of stages, including years after diagnosis. What changes with time is where we start and how we pace it, not whether it is worth doing. We are not going to tell you this changes the diagnosis, because it does not. What we work on is step length, arm swing, turning, getting out of a chair, and the balance underneath all of it. Marjorie Kerestesy, PTA, is LSVT BIG certified and NDT trained, and that is the work she does here.

Working hard can make a tremor more visible in the moment. That is not the same as making it worse. Tremor tends to rise with effort, fatigue and stress, then settle again with rest, which is alarming the first time you see it. So we build effort in steps and watch how you respond, one-on-one with a licensed physical therapist, every visit. If a session is asking too much of you, we change the dose that day.

No. Ohio is a direct-access state, so you can start physical therapy without one. Plenty of people here still keep their neurologist in the loop, and we are glad to send notes along on request. Your first step is an evaluation with a licensed physical therapist, and none of it waits on a piece of paper.

Book Your Visit

Ready when you are.

Request a time and a real person calls you back during clinic hours. No phone tree. No ‘someone will reach out.’ Just a plan.

  • Hours Mon & Wed 8:15am–7:00pm · Tue & Thu 8:15am–5:30pm · Fri 8:15am–3:30pm · Sat & Sun closed
  • (216) 577-1933 Prefer to talk now? Call us.
  • No referral needed, Ohio direct access

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A real person calls, never an autoresponder

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So we know who to look for when you walk in.

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In Motion Physical Therapy

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