Parietal Hold

Common Holds

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  Parietal hold: plastic skull
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  Parietal hold: superior view
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  Parietal hold: Superior view
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  Parietal hold
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  Parietal hold: close up

Overview

Basic Hold

The finger pads rest on the lower margin of the parietal bones, superior to the suture with the temporal bone (squamosal suture‎ or temporal-parietal suture). Typically the temporal-parietal suture is about two fingers superior to the top of the ear. The thumbs can be crossed over the sagittal suture or can float off the skull. Make sure the elbows are supported and the wrists and hands are soft. On inhalation the skull widens side to side, giving rise to a sense of the finger pads being pushed laterally.

Treatment Notes

Parietal bones are simple membranous bones, each parietal is formed from one ossification centre. The eminences of the parietals are good landmarks on the cranial vault. In total there are five eminences of the cranium, you can see four below, the fifth is the precursor of the inion on the occiput. The parietal’s primary respiratory motion by is a simple flaring out movement. There is a widening side to side on inhalation, the inferior lateral margins of the parietals expand laterally. In health it often feels as though the parietals take up space by easing in a superior direction, be open to feeling this motion. Sutherland used to biomechanically offer a ‘parietal lift’, in biodynamics we just orient to the filling, widening and superior lift as a response to the inhalation of the tide.

Relevant Anatomy