Injury Prevention in Festus, MO. Whether you play a sport and are trying to get a shot at the next stage, or a recent retiree who wants to dedicate your time to camping, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the activities you love. While our professional Festus, MO physical therapists work extensively with athletes and others to recover from injury, we are complete movement health specialists who can evaluate your body’s current condition and how you move to teach out measures that are proven to prevent injury. Request an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or call the location most convenient for you.

Being physically active is an essential part of many Festus, MO people’s lives. We love active endeavors such as playing sports, swimming, or other physical activities. Additionally, committing to an active lifestyle reduces the risk of serious health problems such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, eurodegenerative disease, anxiety, and many types of cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Festus, MO physical therapists help you return to action and perform even better than before, but our injury prevention experts can help you reduce the risk of further injury by optimizing your overall movement health. All of our methods, for both healing from and preventing injury, are proven to be effective and are customized for each client and the activities they want to return to.

If you’ve recently suffered an injury, or have a nagging injury that won’t heal on its own, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location nearest you in Festus, MO for a free injury screening. To reduce your chance of an injury and protect your sport or hobby, read on below or inquire about an appointment at your earliest convenience.

Types of Injuries We Prevent Prevent in Festus, MO

Injuries generally fall into two categories:

1. Overuse injuries are injuries happen gradually as a body part degrades because of repetitive movements. They are common in overhead athletes athletes who use throwing or striking motions and commonly manifest themselves as joint pain.
2. Acute injuries are sudden and spontaneous. Examples include falling or receiving a blow. These can result in bruises, sprains and strains, broken bones, and dislocations.

Some common injuries, like rotator cuff tears, can either develop over time or occur suddenly. Other injuries, such as ACL tears, almost always occur spontaneously, such as receiving a direct blow to the knee.

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

While injuries occur for many different reasons, and are sometimes unpreventable, they generally happen because your muscles, ligaments, tendons, bones, and joints cannot hold up under the force, torque, or stretching that are required or are possible in a given activity. There are three primary causes of why your body cannot adjust to an activity:

Muscle Imbalance

Muscle balance is key to supporting joints and staving off injury. Imbalance can lead to overemphasis for one muscle group, causing it to perform actions it cannot do safely. It can also lead to poor 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 insufficient muscle balance between muscle groups, such as having a strong bicep and weak tricep, or in the same muscle group, such as the four muscles in the rotator cuff not having proportionate strength. Symptoms include:

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

Customized injury prevention with our licensed physical therapists in Festus, MO will ensure that different muscles and muscle groups are equally strong.

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can result in poor balance and lead to your body moving in unnatural ways, increasing your risk of injury. Neurological issues, swelling, previous injuries, and muscle imbalance call all contribute to movement dysfunction. Symptoms include:

• Joint mobility restrictions
• Muscle imbalance
• Coordination deficiency
• Decreased balance

At our initial injury prevention appointment in Festus, MO, we’ll go over your medical history and analyze your current movement health, strength, and flexibility. Then, in tandem with with your doctor or any other providers treating you, we’ll design a customized treatment plan based on empirically-backed research and studies to get your movement health to the level you need it to to do what you love.

Posture Dysfunction

Bad posture doesn’t just affect people who sit a lot. People who play sports and others with active lifestyles can have postural dysfunction when at lest, driving, or in certain poses related to a given activity. Optimal posture means proper positioning of your body from your head to your toes in a way that does not remove the spine from its natural curves. Poor posture can bring the joints in the spine closer together, which disrupts our body’s internal communications and makes it harder to achieve ideal motion health. Symptoms include:

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

By helping you understand the best practices for posture, we’ll aid in your injury prevention by ensuring you are using your muscles equally, your flexibility can be improved and maintained, and your nervous system can communicate as its intended to.

Keys to Injury Prevention in Festus, MO

You can still suffer an injury even if you did everything you could to reduce that risk. No one precaution is 100% foolproof in injury prevention. However, there are things you can do to make sure your body is strong and flexible enough for your desired activity level:

• Take a rest — Injuries are more common when you do not give your body time to restore itself. If you have a very high activity level, one or two rest days a week will encourage your body to naturally heal any mild pain or soreness. If you’re moderately active, rest for the rest of the day after an activity so you don’t overwork your muscles and joints.
• Use the correct equipment — Helmets, shin guards, safety pads and guards, and other recommended equipment in sports and other activities can help prevent injuries like lacerations or brain injuries. If you’ve already suffered an injury to a joint or muscle, tendon, or ligament, your Festus, MO doctor or injury prevention professional may suggest braces or Kinesio Taping® to stabilize the affected area. Other measures like tying your shoes tightly offers further protection.
• Increase muscle strength — Strengthening your muscles, tendons, and ligaments helps them withstand the force and torque your body is put through in sports and other activities. In your tailored injury prevention program with our certified Festus, MO physical therapists, we’ll work to achieve optimal muscle balance and strengthen the smaller muscles needed to be able to avoid injury in the activities you love.
• Increase flexibility — Stretching accomplishes three critical things for injury prevention:
  1. It boosts which movements you can make and how far you can extend them, which allows for your tendons and ligaments to adjust to more forceful movements.
  2. It boosts circulation, which allows for nutrient-rich blood to flow to your soft tissue, removing waste byproduct and reinvigorating the muscles.
  3. It improves your posture, which, as you read earlier, is an essential part of injury prevention.

  According to a peer-reviewed sports medicine paper, sports like soccer that include bouncing and jumping require muscles and tendons with sufficient flexibility to perform those movements. Also, it’s important to stretch and warm up before games or training to further reduce the risk of injury.

• Use accepted technique — Through the years, each sport and physical activity develops a consensus of the best ways to position and move your body. These techniques not only help you get be the best athlete you can be but help prevent injuries by not forcing your body into unnatural positions and movements. Football players are taught to tackle a certain way to reduce the risk of a head injury, and rotational athletes like golfers and baseball players learn how to best apply torque to your body. We use DorsaVi video motion analysis to slow down your movement and analyze how to both be a better athlete and reduce your risk of injury.
• Listen to your body — If a part of your body is sore, that’s your body’s way of telling you something isn’t right. If you feel something suddenly that doesn’t feel right, immediately stop all physical activity and seek proportional medical care. If your body isn’t holing up well in an intense training session, don’t force it.
• Don’t play through an injury — While teammates, competitors, and fans appreciate an athlete that guts it out through pain, playing with an injury to a muscle, joint, tendon, or ligament could aggravate an existing injury and put you out of commission for longer than it originally would have. Depending on what caused your injury and how severe it is, you may use methods like the R.I.C.E. method, visiting an emergency room, and a series of physical therapy sessions to make sure your recovery and return to action go as well as possible.
• Play by the rules — Most sports have special rules at different levels to reduce the risk of injury. Penalties for leading with the helmet in football, rules against coming from behind in soccer, and even the existence of bike lanes are examples of rules put in place to prevent injuries to ourselves and others. Those are in place for a reason, and there’s a reason that violations of those rules are punished.
• Consult a professional physical therapist — It’s a good idea to see a doctor before a new season or starting up a new activity or training regimen. During your physical, inquire with your doctor if injury prevention with a experienced physical therapist in Festus, MO is something you should consider. All of our techniques have been proven to reduce the risk of injury, and you plan will be completely unique to you and catered to how old you are, any previous injuries, and which activities you want to participate in.

Injury Prevention for Older Festus, MO Adults

Falls in senior citizens were responsible for over 3 million urgent care visits and more than 34,000 fatalities. Studies show that physical activity can go a long way in preventing falls. Other conditions that cause pain like arthritis that accumulate over time can be effectively managed with physical therapy exercises that keep your muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints healthy. While the physical demands for seniors may not be as high as an athlete, appropriate strength, stability, flexibility, and optimal posture can greatly aid in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Festus, MO include:

• Shin Splint Treatment
• Direct Access Physical Therapy
• Gait Analysis
• Pelvic Floor Therapy
• Dry Needling Near Me
• Tendonitis Treatment
• Manual Physical Therapy
• Orthopedic Rehab Near Me
• Beginner Running Program
• Chronic Pain Treatment

Festus, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Being injured in in an activity you prepare and train for and love causes a mental block that won’t allow us to experience the same elation. The licensed Festus, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to develop your personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body as safe and healthy as can be, and your mind at ease that you can safely return to the activities you love. We will aid you in feeling the physical and mental health benefits that you do not want to lose. Make an appointment online or contact the location nearest you to see what our Festus, MO injury prevention specialists can do for you.