Injury Prevention in Cottleville, MO. Whether you play a sport and are trying to get a shot at the next level, or a recent retiree who wants to spend more time bike riding, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the happy, healthy lifestyle you deserve. While our licensed Cottleville, MO physical therapists work extensively with athletes and others to heal after an injury, we are experts in the entire musculoskeletal system who can evaluate your body’s current condition and how you move to show you methods that are proven to reduce the risk of injury by preparing your body for the stressors of your desired activity. Make an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or reach out to the location most convenient for you.

Being physically active is an essential part of many Cottleville, MO people’s lives. We love activities such as playing sports, biking, and more. Furthermore, committing to an active lifestyle reduces the risk of serious health problems such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, eurodegenerative disease, depression, and many types of cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Cottleville, MO physical therapists help you return to action as fierce as ever, but our injury prevention professionals can help preserve your active lifestyle by improving your overall strength, flexibility, and posture. All of our treatment plans, both when helping restore motion health and when looking to improve it, have been prove to work and are customized for each client and the activities they want to return to.

If you’ve recently sustained an injury, or have a lingering injury that just won’t go away, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location most convenient for you in Cottleville, MO for a complimentary injury screening. To reduce your chance of an injury and ensure that you can keep up with your sport or hobby, keep reading or inquire about an appointment today.

Types of Injuries We Prevent Prevent in Cottleville, MO

Injuries typically fall into two categories:

1. Overuse injuries are injuries that are caused by repetitive movements over time. In sports, we see them the most in in overhead athletes athletes who are required to repeat throwing or striking motions, with joint pain usually being the first warning sign.
2. Acute injuries are sudden and spontaneous. Examples include landing on uneven ground or a sudden impact by an object or another person. These can result in bruises, sprains and strains, fractures, and dislocations.

Some of the injuries we see most frequently, such as rotator cuff tears, can either develop over time or occur suddenly. Other injuries, such as ACL tears, almost always occur spontaneously, with an immediate impact to or twisting of the knee.

Why Do Injuries Happen? | Injury Prevention in Cottleville, MO

While injuries occur for many different reasons, and some are inescapable, they generally happen because of dysfunction or instability and your body and between body parts. There are three main causes of why your body cannot adjust to an activity:

Muscle Imbalance

Muscle balance is key to supporting joints and reducing injury. Imbalance can lead to dependency on one muscle group, which may cause your body to use it in a way it shouldn’t. It also prevents you from having ideal posture, and the weaker set of muscles will be pushed past its limit, resulting in failure and a higher probability of injury. Injuries can be caused by inadequate muscle balance between muscle groups, such as having a strong bicep and weak tricep, or within muscle groups, such as an imbalance between the four muscles of the rotator cuff. Symptoms include:

• Muscle weakness
• Muscle inflexibility
• Poor muscle recruitment
• Coordination deficits

Tailored injury prevention with our professional physical therapists in Cottleville, MO will bring balance to your muscles.

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can result in poor balance and impede your body’s ability to naturally perform functional movements, increasing your risk of injury. Neurological issues, inflammation, previous injuries, and muscle imbalance call all contribute to movement dysfunction. It can lead to:

• Joint mobility restrictions
• Muscle imbalance
• Poor coordination
• Decreased balance

When you first see our injury prevention experts in Cottleville, MO, we’ll go through your medical records and analyze your current movement health, strength, and flexibility. Then, alongside with your physician or any additional providers involved in your treatment, we’ll devise a tailored game plan been proven to work by research and studies to get your body moving as it should.

Posture Dysfunction

Bad posture is not just an issue for people with slouched shoulders. Athletes and others with active lifestyles can have postural dysfunction when resting, driving, or in specific body positions necessary for a given activity. Optimal posture means proper alignments of the different joints and muscles of your body in a way that encourages our spine to stay in its natural curves. Poor posture can bring the joints in the spine closer together, which has a negative affect on our body’s ability to communicate with itself and achieve the strength and range of motion you need to achieve. Symptoms include:

• Muscle weakness
• Muscle imbalance
• Poor positioning
• Joint mobility limitations
• Poor muscle recruitment

By teaching you good posture, we’ll aid in your injury prevention by ensuring you are using the right muscles for the right movements, your flexibility is not jeopardized, and your nervous system can communicate as its intended to.

Keys to Injury Prevention in Cottleville, MO

All sports and physical activities can potentially lead to an injury. No one technique is 100% foolproof in injury prevention. However, there are several steps you can take to greatly reduce the risk of injury:

• Take breaks — Injuries are more common when you do not give your body time to restore itself. If you’re heavily active, make sure to take one or two days off per week to allow your body to naturally heal any mild pain or soreness. If you have a more moderate activity level, relax for the rest of the day after an activity so you don’t overwork your muscles and joints.
• Use the appropriate equipment — Helmets, mouth guards, safety pads and guards, and other equipment necessary in sports and other activities can help prevent injuries like rashes or head injuries. If you’ve already suffered an injury to a joint or muscle, tendon, or ligament, your Cottleville, MO doctor or physical therapist may advise stabilizing braces or Kinesio Taping®. Other methods like making sure all the equipment is snug offers further protection.
• Strengthen muscles — Strengthening soft tissue helps it stand up to the force and torque your body is put through in sports and other activities. Our Cottleville, MO injury prevention professionals will work to build up your body to be able to avoid injury in the activities you want to participate in.
• Improve flexibility — Increasing your flexibility achieves three critical things for injury prevention:
  1. It increases your range of motion, which allows for your soft tissue to adapt to more pronounced movements.
  2. It increases circulation, which carries nutrient-rich blood to your muscles, eliminating waste byproduct and rebuilding the muscles.
  3. It boosts your posture, which, as you read earlier, is is one of the most important aspects of injury prevention.

  According to a peer-reviewed sports medicine paper, sports like football that include bouncing and jumping require muscles and tendons with sufficient flexibility to incorporate and exert the high amount of energy required. Stretching and warm up exercises before activities further helps prevent injuries.

• Use correct technique — In every physical activity, there is an accepted way to position and move your body. These techniques not only improve performance but help prevent injuries. Football players learn to tackle with the shoulder in order to reduce the risk of a head injury, and swimmers learn the proper strokes to make sure their muscles are moving unnaturally. We utilize DorsaVi video motion analysis to break down your movement and analyze how to improve it.
• Don’t ignore what your body is telling you — If you feel pain in a muscle or joint, that’s your body’s way of telling you something is wrong. If you feel something suddenly that doesn’t feel right, immediately withdraw from the activity and seek proportional medical care. If your body does not feel well enough for an intense training session, don’t force it.
• Don’t play through an injury — Even though playing through pain is often viewed as commendable among competitors, forcing your body to perform with soft tissue or structural damage could make that injury worse and put you out of commission for longer than it originally would have. Depending on the severity of your injury, you may use methods like the R.I.C.E. method, seeing an emergency room, and rehab with a physical therapist to ensure your recovery and return to action go as well as possible.
• Play by the rules — Many sports have special rules at different levels to reduce the risk of injury. Penalties for helmet to helmet hits in football, rules against coming from behind in soccer, and even the existence of special lanes on the street and sidewalk for bikers are all rules that were adopted to prevent injuries to ourselves and others. Those are in place for a reason, and there’s a reason that there are penalties for them.
• Consult a professional physical therapist — It’s always advisable to see a doctor before another season begins or committing yourself to any strenuous physical activity. While there, ask your doctor if injury prevention with a knowledgeable physical therapist in Cottleville, MO is right for you. Every treatment plan we employ has been proven to help athletes remain healthy, and you plan will be completely unique to you and catered to how old you are, your injury history, and how physically active you wish to be.

Injury Prevention for Older Cottleville, MO Adults

Falls in the elderly accounted for more than 3 million urgent care admissions and more than 34,000 fatalities. Research demonstrates that physical activity is invaluable in preventing falls. Other conditions that cause pain such as arthritis that are wear and tear injuries can be effectively managed with physical therapy exercises that keep your soft tissue and joints healthy. While the physical demands for older adults may not be as high as an athlete, healthy strength, stability, flexibility, and proper posture are great agents in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Cottleville, MO include:

• Neck Pain Treatment
• Physical Therapy Clinic
• Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Treatment
• Sciatica Treatment
• Sports Medicine
• Hand Pain Physical Therapy
• Foot & Ankle Pain Treatment
• Hip Pain Treatment
• Plantar Fasciitis Treatment
• Stroke Rehabilitation

Cottleville, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Being injured in one of your favorite activities can lead to a mental block that won’t allow us to experience the same exultation. The experienced Cottleville, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to guide you through your own personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body strong and flexible, and your mind confident that you do not have to fear going back to what you love. We will aid you in feeling the physical and mental health benefits that you do not want to lose. Schedule an appointment online or contact the location nearest you to learn more about what our Cottleville, MO injury prevention specialists can do for you.