PAANZ Courses 2026

Unlock the Power of Myofascial Cupping

From elite athletes to social media feeds, cupping is everywhere right now, and your patients have noticed. If you want to confidently answer their questions, master the correct application, and back it all up with evidence-based practice, this is the webinar for you. Even better, it is the perfect way to accelerate patient recovery and improve range of motion, all while giving your own hands a much-needed break.

Join us for an exclusive, practical webinar exploring the science and art of Myofascial Cupping.

While traditional cupping focuses on moving Qi and blood flow through meridians, modern biomedical practitioners often require a different framework to align with evidence-based clinical practice. This webinar bridges that gap. We focus on how sliding cupping uses negative pressure to lift the skin and underlying subcutaneous tissue, rather than compressing it like traditional massage. This dynamic lifting action creates immediate dilation in the tissues, triggering rapid localized healing, powerful pain relief, and faster post-exercise muscle recovery.

Why Fascia Matters

Fascia is packed with nerve endings and is highly responsive to movement. When immobilized, injured, or affected by aging and conditions like diabetes, it stiffens up and becomes a major source of pain, especially in non-specific low back pain involving the thoracolumbar fascia. Cupping is one of the most effective ways to target this tissue and restore fluid, pain-free movement.

What You Will Learn:

• The Science and Evidence: The physiological mechanisms behind cupping, backed by key research and real-world clinical success, so you can answer every patient question with confidence.

• Safe and Effective Practice: Best practices for application, safety protocols, and proper cup hygiene.

• Effortless Integration: How to easily incorporate durable silicon cups into your current routine.

The Best Part? Cupping does the heavy lifting for you. It saves your hands from burnout while delivering incredible results for your clients.

Whether you want to expand your clinical toolkit, meet the growing demand from your patients, or protect your longevity as a practitioner, this webinar will give you the tools to start cupping effectively right away.

Foundation Acupuncture for Musculoskeletal Physiotherapy focuses on the practical integration of acupuncture within musculoskeletal and sports physiotherapy. This course is designed for established physiotherapists who already use needling and want simplified acupuncture concepts that translate into clear, clinically relevant applications. This approach enhances assessment, treatment, and performance outcomes in a busy clinic setting, making your expertise indispensable to both your patients and your practice.

The primary objective is to refine your ability to apply acupuncture using smart, efficient clinical reasoning. Rather than adding more work to your day, acupuncture is positioned as a strategic tool to extend your practice. It allows you to manage complex cases and injury rehabilitation more effectively, ensuring your clinical value remains high without sacrificing core physiotherapy principles.

Through structured instruction and hands-on application, you will develop a more streamlined approach to musculoskeletal assessment and treatment. We explore strategic acupuncture not just for pain management, but as a proactive way to improve movement efficiency and functional recovery.

What You Will Take Away:

• Clinically Efficient Protocols: Master streamlined treatment approaches and practical skill development that slot perfectly into a packed schedule.
• Immediate Feedback: Reinforce your learning through immediate clinical effects observed right during the practical sessions.
• Elite Case Studies: Learn from real-world examples drawn from current practice with high-performance athletes competing at the highest professional levels, with approaches directly transferable to everyday clinical settings.

Course Participation We designed this course specifically for musculoskeletal practitioners who are already comfortable with needling and ready to move beyond the basics. To ensure we maintain a high standard of practical learning, we recommend completing either Foundation Dry Needling, Foundation Acupuncture Part A, or a similar qualification first. This foundation ensures you can dive straight into the practical content and walk away with skills you can use in your clinic the very next day.

Prerequisites: All attendees must be registered in New Zealand with a current Annual Practicing Certificate (APC) that includes needling within their scope of practice.

This foundation course, taught by Trevor Montgomery in association with PAANZ, is suitable for all physiotherapists wishing to expand their clinical reasoning and treatment skill sets with the use of dry needling. The course has a large practical component with particular emphasis on safe needling practice as set out in the latest PAANZ safety guidelines.

The course is an introduction to Dry Needling, learning to needle major muscle groups in all areas of the body, but focused looking at conditions such as Achilles Tendonosis, Shoulder Impingement, and SIJ dysfunctions. As we look at each of these conditions, we teach you how to needle trigger points in the muscles that may be dysfunctional in those conditions and then look at how to rehab the conditions using exercises/stretches that Trevor has developed. The Foundation Course teaches you to needle most major muscle groups in the body safely and plenty to take back and use with patients on Monday morning! However, we do not needle over the thorax in the Foundation Course because of the risk of pneumothorax. Needling muscles over the thorax is considered more advanced and, therefore, is included in the Advanced Upper Limb Course.

The course is designed to help practitioners integrate dry needling into their clinical approach to address the underlying causes of some of the more common clinical presentations we treat. Having taught over 240 introductory and advanced courses for AUT, PAANZ, the APA of Australia and Asia over the last 18 years. Trevor brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to his teaching in this specialty area.

Prerequisites: All attendees must be registered in New Zealand and have a current APC. Non-PAANZ members and non-PNZ members are welcome.

Foundation of Traditional Acupuncture is a two-day, foundational yet intensive course designed to support physiotherapists and other regulated health professionals in developing robust clinical decision-making when integrating acupuncture into musculoskeletal practice.

The course presents core Traditional Acupuncture theory through a contemporary physiotherapy lens, translating traditional paradigms into clinically relevant frameworks applicable to pain, injury, and functional dysfunction.

The curriculum introduces essential traditional concepts including Yin–Yang theory, the Five Elements, Qi, Blood and Body Fluids, Zang Fu organ relationships, channel systems, and Bi syndrome differentiation. These principles are explored with a clear emphasis on how traditional pattern recognition informs assessment, reasoning, and treatment strategy in musculoskeletal and sports-related presentations. Rather than rote memorisation of theory, participants are guided to apply traditional concepts pragmatically to enhance clinical reasoning alongside established physiotherapy assessment and biomechanical models.

Teaching balances structured theoretical instruction with practical application (approximately 60:40 theory to practice), reinforcing learning through case-based discussion, palpation, point selection strategies, and supervised needling practice. Acupuncture is positioned as a clinical tool to extend physiotherapy practice, supporting pain modulation, tissue recovery, movement efficiency, and long-term capacity building. Cupping is introduced as a supportive modality within this framework.

Please note: This course is intended for practitioners who have completed Foundation Acupuncture Parts A and B, or equivalent training, and are competent in needling techniques. It provides a critical theoretical foundation for more advanced musculoskeletal acupuncture education, while remaining directly transferable to everyday clinical practice.

Vignette evenings are an interactive session. You do not have to provide a case study and there will be breakout groups to discuss the cases brought up for discussion.

Michelle runs a physiotherapy practice in Christchurch – AcuPhysio Ltd. She integrates pain science, needling, and nervous system regulation with a deep understanding of the mind–body connection. With decades of clinical experience, she is known for looking beyond symptoms to uncover the patterns, beliefs, and protective responses that keep people stuck, and for helping people take back control of their healing.

The case studies she will be discussing in the upcoming vignette will draw from the clients and experiences she has had.

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing the Zoom link.

The Advanced Dry Needling course for the Upper Half of the Body aims to teach course participants how to needle myofascial components from T7 upward. This is a practical course, including the teaching of advanced techniques around the scapulothoracic region, shoulder, upper limbs, and neck, with particular emphasis on safety and efficacy. One of the major goals is for participants to integrate the use of dry needling into their clinical reasoning process and their clinical approach to treat common (and not so common) upper body conditions.

Case studies will be discussed to further enhance the clinical reasoning behind the use of dry needling and its integration with other physiotherapy skill sets, such as manual therapy, muscle balancing, exercise prescription, and postural advice.

Having taught over 240 introductory and advanced courses for AUT, PAANZ, the APA of Australia and Asia over the last 18 years, Trevor brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to his teaching in this specialty area.

Course Prerequisites: Attendance requires completion of one of the following courses:

• PAANZ Foundation Dry Needling Course,
• APA Introductory Segmental and Dry Needling Course, or
• Post-Graduate Western Acupuncture qualification from AUT or Otago.

If you have undertaken dry needling training from another provider, please contact the PAANZ administrator to see if it qualifies as a prerequisite for the Advanced Course. All attendees must be registered as a health professional in New Zealand and have a current APC.

1. Review key mechanisms of manual therapy and needling in the light of current pain sciences

2. Discuss combining needling with manual therapy

3. Review current safety guidelines for needling

4. Review contraindications to manual therapy

5. Select multimodal treatment approaches for cervicogenic headaches

1. Review the anatomy of the lung fields
2. Review key acupuncture point and trigger point locations over the lung fields
3. Review needling techniques to ensure safety of practice over the lung fields
4. Review patient screening for acupuncture
5. Review the practice of gaining of appropriate informed consent
6. Reflect on the current literature on pneumothoraces and its implications to current practice

Part A is a two-day theory and practical course designed for physiotherapists with dry needling training only, as well as those with no prior acupuncture or needling experience. It also provides a structured refresher for clinicians wishing to revisit the core principles underpinning safe, effective needling practice.

The course commences with an online pre-course lecture focusing on the safe application of needling. This includes informed consent, patient screening, skin disinfection and its clinical rationale, safe needle handling, and first aid principles relevant to needling-related incidents.

The two-day face-to-face component develops practical competence and clinical reasoning in needling practice. Content includes an overview of needling techniques, an introduction to acupuncture concepts, and foundational neuroscience principles to support clinical decision-making. Participants are introduced to acupuncture meridian pathways and will practise needling a selection of commonly used acupuncture points.

The emphasis of Part A is to support clinicians who are new to needling to broaden their clinical skill set beyond trigger point dry needling, while developing an understanding of acupuncture-related concepts that enhance treatment selection and patient outcomes. Participants will gain insight into the mechanisms of action, potential risks, and expected responses associated with needling interventions.

Throughout the course, participants are required to demonstrate safe needling of acupuncture points, discuss relevant tissue innervation, and explain the clinical application of each point. Case study analysis is integrated to support clinical reasoning around when and how acupuncture may be incorporated to complement physiotherapy management and enhance patient outcomes.

Vignette evenings are an interactive session. You do not have to provide a case study and there will be breakout groups to discuss the cases brought up for discussion.

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing the Zoom link.

This foundation course, taught by Trevor Montgomery in association with PAANZ, is suitable for all physiotherapists wishing to expand their clinical reasoning and treatment skill sets with the use of dry needling. The course has a large practical component with particular emphasis on safe needling practice as set out in the latest PAANZ safety guidelines.

The course is an introduction to Dry Needling, learning to needle major muscle groups in all areas of the body, but focused looking at conditions such as Achilles Tendonosis, Shoulder Impingement, and SIJ dysfunctions. As we look at each of these conditions, we teach you how to needle trigger points in the muscles that may be dysfunctional in those conditions and then look at how to rehab the conditions using exercises/stretches that Trevor has developed. The Foundation Course teaches you to needle most major muscle groups in the body safely and plenty to take back and use with patients on Monday morning! However, we do not needle over the thorax in the Foundation Course because of the risk of pneumothorax. Needling muscles over the thorax is considered more advanced and, therefore, is included in the Advanced Upper Limb Course.

The course is designed to help practitioners integrate dry needling into their clinical approach to address the underlying causes of some of the more common clinical presentations we treat. Having taught over 240 introductory and advanced courses for AUT, PAANZ, the APA of Australia and Asia over the last 18 years. Trevor brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to his teaching in this specialty area.

Prerequisites: All attendees must be registered in New Zealand and have a current APC. Non-PAANZ members and non-PNZ members are welcome.