Physiologix Therapy Solutions

Our Team

Meet our team at Physiologix

Kirsty McNab - Sports and Exercise Physiotherapist, The Gap

Kirsty is a recognised APA Sports Physiotherapist, a title which can only be obtained after completing a post graduate masters in sports Physio therapy (which she did in 2006). She is one of 4 Physios selected to work at The Australian Tennis Open each year, with the women's main draw. In 2017 she was awarded a long service award following her 10th year working for the event. She also provides physio coverage, treating the players, for the Queensland Academy of Tennis at Tennyson on a regular basis.

For the 5 years prior to becoming involved Tennis, she provided physiotherapy for the Australian Short Track Speed Skating, traveling extensively to World Cups.

“I am passionate about healing my clients and giving them their optimal performance for their busy lives!”

In 2006 she was selected as a Physiotherapist for the Australian Team at the 2006 Winter Olympics.

Kirsty qualified in 1998 as a Bachelor of Physiotherapy with Honours in the UK. Coming to Australia in 2000, she has worked with and treated a multitude of sporting disciplines including triathlon at the Goodwill Games and Brisbane Premiership rugby union. In addition, she has been involved in teaching within the University of Queensland post-grad Physiotherapy courses and running courses for Physiotherapists nationally, including on hip and shoulder rehabilitation.

Gena Wallis - Sports and Exercise Physiotherapist, The Gap

Gena is a kiwi born and trained physiotherapist who graduated in 2008 from the University of Otago in New Zealand. She currently also works with Tennis Australia with the Queensland National Academy, and is the treating physio at local Pro-tour events. She is highly sought after thanks to her skills, somehow also fitting in being the physio for the UQ Rugby 7's womens team, travelling extensively interstate. She has worked in private practice IN NZ, Canada and Brisbane where she gained experience in treating a wide variety of musculoskeletal conditions. She has a special interest in treating sports and running related injuries, tendon pathologies as well as spinal conditions.

She utilises a variety of techniques including dry needling, exercise and clinical Pilates (which she has taught for over 5 years) to help her clients return to sports, work or day to day function. Gena particularly enjoys seeing a client get back to sports feeling stronger, motivated and ready to play after an injury.

Gena completed her post graduate degree in Masters of Sports physio in 2017 at the University of Queensland. She continues her ambition is to become a high performance sports physio and to develop her skills as a clinician. Outside of work and study Gena is a keen sports women herself playing tennis, going to the gym, running and yoga. Gena likes to portray a healthy lifestyle and enjoys giving advice to her clients about a healthy diet and getting active.

Maria-Jose - Senior Physiotherapist, The Gap

MJ sports physiotherapist the gap Maria Jose (MJ) has recently arrived to Brisbane from a year of travel around Australia with her Husband and small children.

MJ has worked as a contractor for Tennis Australia for the past 10 years. She has been also been involved at the Australian Open Women’s Tennis for the past 7 years. She has worked at the New South Wales and Queensland Tennis Academy and multiple tournaments around the country. Besides Tennis, MJ has also been involved with state Netball, AFL, Athletics and Rugby Union.

MJ has a passion to getting her clients back to their favourite activity. She enjoys helping people understand and taking control of their injuries by tailoring exercise programs that can work in each personal situation. MJ enjoys keeping up to date regarding the latest Physiotherapy evidence and she particularly enjoys helping mums return to sports after children.

MJ completed her Physiotherapy degree in South America in 2007, Since then she has worked in private practice for over 13 years including Sydney, Victoria and Wollongong regions.

Maria Jose and her family enjoy the outdoors, regularly camping and hiking around this beautiful country. She likes to keep healthy by cycling, running, swimming and playing Tennis.

Gabriel Fernandes - Senior Physiotherapist, The Gap & Ph.D candidate

Gabriel Musculoskeletal & Sports Physiotherapy The Gap

Gabriel is a physiotherapist from Brazil, with over 10 years experience in Musculoskeletal & Sports physiotherapy, having worked with elite athletes from a range of sports throughout his career as a physiotherapist, from beach volleyball, running and triathlon, rowing, rugby union, soccer to all sorts of weekend warriors athletes.

Between 2011-2016, Gabe worked as physio for the Italian Women's Beach Volleyball team in preparation for the London 2012 Olympic Games, through several tournaments including The Rio 2016 Grand Slam until the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

Just after the Rio Olympic Games, Gabe moved to Australia to work as a physio in private practice. A highlight of his time here as a sports physio was to have worked at GC2018 Commonwealth Games, at the Beach Volleyball arena in Coolangatta.

Gabe has specialised in running injuries and uses running analysis, amongst other tests, to assist you during the transition from injury to return to running.

Another special interests of his are tendon issues such as Achilles tendinopathy, rotator cuff, gluteal and patellar tendinopathy. Combining both areas of interest, Gabe is finishing his PhD at QUT, investigating runners with Achilles tendinopathy.

While Gabe has specialised in treating elite athletes, he is very active in managing all manner of musculoskeletal conditions in athletes and non-athletes alike. His work as allies manual therapy and exercise prescription to give his patients the best research-based treatment and help them achieve their goals regardless of their level of activity

Vanessa Alvaro - Sports and Exercise Physiotherapist, The Gap

vanessa sports and exercise physio The Gap 4061

Vanessa completed her Bachelor of Physiotherapy degree at the University of South Australia in 2012, before going on to study a Masters of Sports Physiotherapy through LaTrobe University, graduating in 2021. She is a Titled APA Sports and Exercise Physiotherapist. Vanessa was also a member of the SA committee for the Sports and Exercise Physiotherapy group, in conjunction with the Australian Physiotherapy Association, for 3 years.

Vanessa joins that team at Physiologix Therapy Solutions after working in large sports medicine practices in Darwin and Sydney, where she practiced in close conjunction with Sports Physicians and Orthopaedic Surgeons.

Vanessa has worked across a number of sporting codes in her career, including rowing, rugby union, cricket, netball and swimming. Most recently she was involved with the Athletics NSW and Gymnastics NSW state representative teams at their National Championships, as well as the Netball NSW academy and development squads. She is also contracted by Rowing Australia to assist with their Underage pathways teams. Vanessa has provided coverage at a number of large multi-sport events including the World University Games, Alice Springs Masters games and Arafura Games. Additionally, she has travelled internationally with the Australian Blind Cricket Team and Australian Men’s Netball Squads.

An eager athlete herself, Vanessa has personal experience across a range of sporting disciplines including running, swimming, triathlons, dance, tennis, basketball, volleyball and martial arts. She is a competitive road runner, recently competing in the Sydney Morning Herald half marathon, but also enjoys trail running. Vanessa is passionate about working with adolescents to ensure that they develop optimal technique and training schedules as they enter development pathways. She also strives to inspire recreational athletes to continue to remain active across their lifespan, whilst maintaining enjoyment and minimising their risk of injury.

Since graduating Vanessa has worked in private practices, assisting people of all ages and levels return to their sporting and recreational pursuits. She is passionate about working with clients to achieve their goals, through education, self-management, manual therapy, exercise prescription and training modifications. Vanessa is highly skilled in completing a thorough assessment to determine the most appropriate evidence-based management plan. This may range from acute injuries and post-operatively to persistent injuries or longer-term rehabilitation. She has the skills and knowledge to guide you through each stage f this process.

Georgie White (Remedial Massage Therapist, The Gap)

Georgie remedial massage therapist the gap

Georgie is an extremely experienced therapist who will help keep you doing the things you love.

She completed her diploma in Remedial Massage in 2007 after studying in Melbourne and Brisbane. Since then, she has worked primarily in clinical multi-disciplinary environments to provide complete care and successful outcomes for her clients.

As an active runner, keen bushwalker, and mum, Georgie knows how important it is to keep you doing the things you love. From desk workers suffering from nagging headaches or shoulder pain to athletes concerned with hamstring niggles, Georgie provides relief and results through her hands-on care.

Georgie is passionate about taking a whole system approach to her treatments– she understands how the different systems of the body are interconnected and how to get the best outcome for you through massage.

Georgie will always work with you, your body, and your needs. You can expect a slightly firmer style massage with clear communication to ensure the pressure is just right.

Ilya Bubnov, Remedial Massage Therapist, The Gap

Ilya is a fully-qualified Remedial Massage Therapist with local and international certifications and experience. Following his passion to learn more about the body and mind, he has travelled around Australia and internationally in order to study Massage and various healing disciplines aimed at both therapeutic service and self-help. This has allowed him to create his own unique style which is a mixture of Traditional Remedial, Intuitive Remedial, Spanish Chiromassage, Hawaiian Lomi Lomi and Traditional Thai. His extensive wealth of experience and knowledge gives him a huge repertoire of skills to use in finding the right approach for each and every person, and their specific issues.

His therapeutic interests include headaches, the connection between psychological stress and physical issues (hugely relevant in chronic pain) and whole-body reconnection & balancing. He loves using his skills as a massage therapist to bring all the systems together to ensure the best healing response.

Ilya has a huge diversity of other interests including in martial arts and yoga. And he has a great love of learning, always wanting to know more about how things work and why. This has driven a huge personal interest in the learning of self-awareness and modernised Buddhism. The difficulty in understanding these concepts inspired him to write a book on the subject.

You will be in great hands, no matter what your issues are.

Moira, enthusiastic and experienced pilates instructor

Moira Mitchel

Completing her Diploma of Pilates instruction with Pilates International Training Centre at the end of 2015, Moira is an enthusiastic and experienced instructor. Over the last 5 years she has worked in many areas including with post-operative and rehab patients, pre and postnatal clients, clients with complex musculoskeletal disorders as well as clients without injury that are looking at strength and fitness, through to athletes looking at enhanced training specific to their sports performance.

Passionate about the personal application of exercise for each individual body, she is continually learning about the body and exercise techniques.

Having come to Pilates through injury, Moira understands well how moving from pain to strength empowers all aspects of one’s life.

We are extremely lucky to have Moira join our incredible group of pilates instructors bringing you so many more small, supervised equipment based classes each week.

Cheniqua Wipa

Cheniqua is an accredited clinical Pilates instructor and we are delighted that she has come to work with us on her arrival in Brisbane.

Cheniqua has recently relocated from Sydney where she originally did her Pilates diploma training. She previously had a career in music copyright helping songwriters get paid accurately for their music. Departing the corporate world to becoming a Pilates Instructor, she has loved the journey of embarking on the highly rewarding path of helping people move and feel better.

She resonates strongly with this holistic system of exercise that rehabilitates and aims to enable each and every one of us to carry out our daily tasks with minimal effort and injury for as long as possible. Knowing that Pilates achieves this by exploring multidimensional ranges of movement, promoting good posture, mental clarity, and improve breathing, she continues to practice Pilates and reap its benefits.

Duncan Hill

duncan clinical Pilates Instructor headshot 250x230 Duncan's journey into Pilates Instructing comes after a decade of working in the media in both Brisbane and Sydney. Duncan had a varied media career starting off writing music journalism before working for large media institutions, including SBS, Bauer Media, and Thomson Reuters Australia. It was while working now-defunct Bauer Media's Men's Health magazine, writing advertorial articles like "10 ways to get Big Arms for summer" and "Get Beach Body Ready in 6 Easy Steps", was where Duncan was first introduced to the Pilates Method while writing an article about the popularity of Pilates in Sydney. He quickly knew that was where he would focus his career change.

While undertaking the career change into Health, Duncan has started studying for a Bachelor of Physiotherapy. He is looking for a career path where he would be able to use his eye for fine detail and empathetic nature to positively impact patients' rehabilitation from injury and health, creating lasting results. Duncan holistically views movement and fitness and incorporates movement practices including Pilates, weight training, Golf, and meditation into his life.

Duncan values learning and is looking forward to the experience he will gain from being a part of the Physiologix team.

Tessa Funk (Dietitian)

Tessa is an Accredited Practicing Dietitian (APD) and completed her Masters of Dietetic Studies in 2020 at the University of Queensland. You may recognise Tessa from around the Gap Health and Racquet Club as she has been a part of the community for many years, working as part of the reception team and being a fitness instructor at GHRC. In her spare time you will find Tessa in the gym or partaking in one of the Group Fitness classes or enjoying a coffee in the cafe.

Throughout her degree Tessa has had experience working within both clinical and private practice spaces with a wide variety of clients and conditions. Since graduating, Tessa has completed two private-practice internships with APDs to gain invaluable experience in her interest areas, including gastro-intestinal issues, weight loss, sport nutrition and chronic and degenerative diseases. Tessa is passionate about educating others on nutrition and helping them to live a balanced, healthy lifestyle. She will work with you to ensure that your food and nutrition are supporting your specific needs and create healthy habits to help transform your lifestyle.

Remember to discuss seeing a dietician with your GP to see if you qualify for referral under Medicare. Your appointment may also be covered by your private health cover.

A dietitian can help you with tips and guidance anywhere from meal planning to just advice and information on:

- Weight Loss

- Exercise and diet

- Recovery

- Diet for Inflammatory Conditions

- Diet for Osteoporosis

- Gut Health

- Food Intolerance

- Elimination Diet

- Fodmap

She will be available to see at Physiologix, upstairs at The Gap Health and Racquet Club Mondays 2-7pm.

For bookings call her directly on 0402 234 478 or email her at tessafunknutrition@gmail.com

Read more from Tessa in this great article about Nutrition for Kids Playing Sports

CONTACT US

(at Gap Health & Racquet Club)
200 Settlement Rd, The Gap
(07) 3511 1112

OPENING HOURS

MON - THURS: 7:00am - 7:00pm
FRI: 7:00am - 4:00pm
SAT: 8:00am - 12:00pm

physiologix logo small

Latest Newsletter | Newsletter Archive

Running injuries: what to do? Should you stop running? Will everyone benefit from a running assessment?

: 06/23/2022

Remedial Massage (Brisbane)

: 05/24/2022