ACL Tear Greater St. Charles, MO. ACL tears can unexpectedly obstruct your active and daily routine. You go from having a blast in a sport or playing with your kids, to suddenly wondering whether you’ll get to play or even go back to your job again. At Axes Physical Therapy in St. Charles, MO, we have dedicated our practice to restoring our patients’ mobility and returning them to the activities they love. Our ACL tear rehabilitation specialists work in concert with you as a team and design personalized treatments plans that have been empirically proven to be effective. If you’ve suffered an ACL tear, or any other injury, in St. Charles, MO, contact us online or find the most convenient Axes location for you. We focus on getting every patient positive results and getting you back to the things that matter most to you, whether that means breaking defender’s ankles on a St. Charles, MO basketball court, or picking up your grandchildren without any pain.

The Anterior Cruciate Ligament | St. Charles, MO Physical Therapy

Ligaments are bands found in joints made of durable, flexible fibrous tissue that connect two bones. The ligaments in the knee help maintain stability in your knee by attaching your tibia (shinbone) to your femur (thigh bone). The ACL, or anterior cruciate ligament, is in the center of your knee and crosses the posterior cruciate ligament (PCL) so they make an “x”. The ACL and PCL work in concert to control the forward and backward movement of your knee, and the ACL safeguards the tibia from moving too far forward on the femur and supplies rotational stability.

ACL tears can be either partial or complete. Depending on the grade of your ACL tear, your capacity to put weight on your knee and your movement will be affected. No Matter how severe your injury, trust in the St. Charles, MO licensed physical therapists of Axes to help you attain a complete recovery.

Causes of an ACL Tear | St. Charles, MO Physical Therapy

There are as many as 250,000 ACL injuries nationwide annually, and it is one of the most frequent knee injuries and sports injuries. They are common in contact sports that entail frequent and fast cutting and changing directions, such as football, baseball, soccer, and basketball. According to the National Athletic Trainers’ Association, the vast majority of ACL tears occur in non-contact injuries, such as changing direction rapidly, and the rest are because of direct blunt force trauma. External and internal factors could both be at play when you sustain an ACL tear:

External Factors

These are when your movement is interrupted immediately before the injury. Some examples are:

• Landing on uneven ground or landing with improper form
• Colliding with something or someone
• A sudden reduction in speed or switching direction
• Spinning with a firmly planted foot
• Receiving a direct hit to the knee

Internal Factors

These have to do with the structure and anatomy of the knee and legs. Some examples are:

• The anatomical differences between men and women
• Flexibility of the hamstring
• Genetic differences

ACL tears don’t just occur in sports, falls and work-related injuries can harm they ACL as well. They can become more common as we age and our bodies weaken. Women are 4-6 times more likely to sustain an ACL tear, likely because of anatomical differences.

Symptoms of an ACL Tear | St. Charles, MO Physical Therapy

After an ACL tear, the pain will likely be in the middle of the knee. You might not necessarily feel sever pain after an ACL tear except if other structural damage was done to the knee. Some signals that you may have sustained an ACL tear are:

• A “popping” sensation in your knee
• Having to cease activity
• Your knee becoming inflamed quickly
• Loss of range of motion
• Not being able to put any weight on your knee

If you think you’ve suffered an ACL tear, it’s critical to reach out to a physician or a licensed physical therapist in St. Charles, MO to diagnose your injury and start the treatment you need to recover. We offer free, no-obligation injury screenings and have a wide network of trusted physicians in St. Charles, MO that we can connect you with. Your Axes physical or occupational therapist is an essential part of your recovery team, working closely with you and your doctors and medical providers to collaborate on your safe and efficient recovery.

ACL Tear Treatments | St. Charles, MO Physical Therapy

It is essential to get prompt, effective, personalized treatment for your ACL tear. If your injury does not heal don’t, it can lead to health conditions like obesity or osteoarthritis, which can greatly affect you for the remainder of your life.

Immediately after your ACL tear, you should use over-the-counter pain medication and the R.I.C.E. method to alleviate pain and inflammation. In an examination, a doctor will assess your range of motion, and likely order an MRI to confirm the ACL tear and gauge the completeness and grade of your tear.

As there is no blood flow to the ligament, a complete ACL tear will not be able to regenerate by itself. This means that you will need the help of licensed professional physical therapists in order to get back to the activities you love. The only way to fully repair an ACL tear is through surgery. So, surgery is often recommended for younger people, athletes who need their knee reconstructed in order to perform, patients with other serious injury to other parts of their knee, or those whose ACL tear causes their knee to buckle in basic, everyday tasks. In an ACL surgery, a surgeon will remove the injured ACL, take a graft from another one of your or a donors tendons, and use small incisions to attach it to the bones.

Once the new ligament is attached, you still have a long way to go before you’ll feel fully back to normal. After surgery, you may need crutches to move around, as your quadriceps muscles will weaken from disuse. Axes Physical Therapy offers both pre- and post-surgical rehabilitation for ACL tears in St. Charles, MO to optimize your recovery and the success of your surgery. Our ACL tear physical therapy experts will lead you through your recovery process with proven, customized physical therapy. As part of your treatment plan, we will:

• Reduce pain and swelling
• Provide patient education so you understand your injury and why our methods work
• Gradually and successfully get you back to bearing weight
• Fit you for a brace and teach you how to safely use it
• Do movement exercises and balance exercises to return range of motion
• Perform strength exercises to increase strength
• Potentially use electrical stimulation to return strength and flexibility

You have the best chance for a full recovery by actively participating in it and trusting the licensed St. Charles, MO area physical therapists of Axes. Before you know it, we will return you to dominating the local softball league, or just enjoying being able to to sit down and stand up without any pain.

How to Prevent an ACL Tear | St. Charles, MO Physical Therapy

Unfortunately, many people sustain a second ACL tear and they can result in life-long repercussions. Included in your treatment program in St. Charles, MO, our Certified Athletic Trainers will help you understand the best practices that help to avoid another ACL tear down the line. Some of the preventive methods you can take in order to prevent further injury are:

• Strengthen your core
• Strengthen your hip and leg muscles
• Practice correct technique, for instance always landing with your feet directly over your knee
• Stretch consistently
• Perform balance exercises
• Perform warm-up exercises before sports or other physical activities
• Make sure you are using appropriate footwear

Our physical therapists dedicate themselves not only to retuning you to the things you love to do, but doing what we can to ensure that you can carry on doing them without being upended by another injury.

Some of the other services we offer in St. Charles, MO are:

• Stroke Rehabilitation
• Hip Replacement Physical Therapy
• Workers Comp' Physical Therapy
• Migraine Relief
• Sprain and Strain Treatment
• Geriatric Physical Therapy
• Injury Rehabilitation
• Pain Management Services
• TMJ Treatment
• Herniated Disc Treatment

ACL Tear in St. Charles, MO | Axes Physical Therapy

It is normal to be nervous about your prognosis and road to recovery after being seriously injured. If you’ve sustained an ACL tear, you probably want to get back to your normal, active lifestyle as quickly as possible. Trust in the experienced professionals of Axes Physical Therapy to work alongside you to create a proven, customized rehabilitation plan to get you back to the basketball court, gymnasts’ mat, or just back to your normal, pain-free daily activities. Contact us online or call the location are closest to you.