ACL Tear Greater Warrenton, MO. ACL tears can suddenly disrupt 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 to work again. At Axes Physical Therapy in Warrenton, 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 tandem with you as a team and design personalized treatments plans that have been empirically proven to be effective. If you’ve sustained an ACL tear, or any other injury, in Warrenton, MO, contact us online or check out the most convenient Axes location for you. We dedicate ourselves to getting every patient positive results and getting you back to the things that matter most to you, whether that means dominating your local Warrenton, MO pickleball league, or carrying your children on your shoulders without any pain.

What is the ACL? | Warrenton, MO Physical Therapy

Ligaments are bands found in joints made of durable, pliable connective tissue that affix two bones. The ligaments in the knee work to maintain stability in your knee by connecting your tibia (shinbone) to your femur (thigh bone). The ACL, or anterior cruciate ligament, runs down the center of your knee and forms an “X” with the posterior cruciate ligament (PCL). The ACL and PCL work in concert to control the forward and backward movement of your knee, and the ACL stops the tibia from slipping 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 Warrenton, MO licensed physical therapists of Axes to help you reach a complete recovery.

Causes of an ACL Tear | Warrenton, MO Physical Therapy

There are as many as 250,000 ACL injuries nationwide every year, and it is one of the most common knee injuries and sports injuries. They are common in contact sports that demand frequent and fast cutting and changing directions, such as football, baseball, soccer, and basketball. According to the National Athletic Trainers’ Association, 70% of ACL tears happen in non-contact injuries, such as changing direction quickly, and the rest are due to direct blunt force trauma. External and internal factors could both be at play when you suffer an ACL tear:

External Factors

These are when your coordination is obstructed immediately before the injury. Some examples are:

• Landing on uneven footing or landing awkwardly
• Something or someone knocking into you
• A sudden reduction in speed or changing direction
• Spinning with a firmly planted foot
• Sustaining a direct blow to the knee

Internal Factors

These are related to the structure and anatomy of the knee and legs. Some examples are:

• The differences in anatomy between men and women
• Flexibility of the hamstring
• Differences in genetics

While many ACL tears transpire in sports, they are also common in falls and work-related injuries. The elderly are also at high risk, as our bodies degenerate as we age. Women are 4-6 times more likely to sustain an ACL tear, likely as a result of anatomical differences.

Symptoms of an ACL Tear | Warrenton, MO Physical Therapy

When you suffer an ACL tear, you’ll likely feel pain in the middle of the knee. An ACL tear does not always cause significant pain except if other parts of the knee were also injured. Some indicators that you might have torn your ACL are:

• Feeling or hearing a pop in your knee
• Having to cease activity
• Your knee becoming inflamed quickly
• Reduction of range of motion
• Not being able to put any weight on your knee

If you think you’ve sustained an ACL tear, it’s crucial to contact a doctor or a licensed physical therapist in Warrenton, MO to verify your injury and start the treatment you need to recover. We offer complimentary, no-obligation injury screenings and have a wide network of trusted doctors in Warrenton, MO that we can refer you to. Your Axes physical or occupational therapist, your doctor and medical providers, and you will form a close team and work together to ensure your recovery is safe and efficient.

How to Treat an ACL Tear | Warrenton, MO Physical Therapy

It is vital to get effective and personalized treatment soon after your ACL tear. If you wait, or your treatment is ineffective, it can lead to problems like obesity or osteoarthritis, which can greatly affect you for the remainder of your life.

Immediately after your ACL tear, it’s best to use over-the-counter pain medication and the R.I.C.E. method to manage pain and swelling. In an examination, a doctor will evaluate your mobility, and likely order an MRI or other tests to confirm the ACL tear and judge the completeness and grade of your tear.

As there is no blood flow to the ligament, a complete ACL tear cannot heal on its own. That is why the aid of a licensed professional physical therapist is necessary to return to the activities you love. The only way to fully repair an ACL tear is through surgery. So, surgery is often advisable for younger people, athletes who need a fully functioning ACL in order to play, patients with other significant 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 in place, you still have a long way to go before you’ll feel fully back to normal. After surgery, you’ll likely need crutches to move around, as your quadriceps muscles will have weakened. Axes Physical Therapy offers both pre- and post-surgical rehabilitation for ACL tears in Warrenton, MO to optimize your recovery and the success of your surgery. Our ACL tear physical therapy specialists will lead you through your recovery process with a personalized treatment plan that has been demonstrated to work. Our treatment methods will help to:

• Mitigate pain and swelling
• Provide patient education so you understand your injury and why our methods work
• Gradually and effectively allow you to put weight on your knee again
• Fit you for a brace and teach you how to safely use it
• Perform movement exercises and balance exercises to increase range of motion
• Perform strength exercises to return you to full strength
• Potentially use electrical stimulation as a supplement to the exercises

When you work with the knowledgeable Warrenton, MO area physical therapists of Axes and take an active role in your recovery, you have the best chance of a complete and timely recovery. Before you know it, we will get you back to dominating the local pick-up league, or just enjoying being able to to sit down and stand up without feeling any instability in your knee.

How to Prevent an ACL Tear | Warrenton, MO Physical Therapy

Unfortunately, second ACL tears are common and they can lead to life-long repercussions. Included in your treatment program in Warrenton, MO, our Certified Athletic Trainers will help you understand the best practices that help to avoid another ACL tear down the line. We recommend some of the following steps to prevent further injury:

• Strengthen your core
• Strengthen your hip and leg muscles
• Practice proper 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 devote 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 Warrenton, 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 Warrenton, MO | Axes Physical Therapy

It is normal to experience anxieties about your your future after being seriously injured. If you’ve sustained an ACL tear, you might be impatient to return to your active lifestyle and physical activities you value. Trust in the knowledgeable professionals of Axes Physical Therapy to work alongside you to produce a proven, personalized physical therapy plan to return you 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.