Flint Hill, MO

Flint Hill, MO

Don't let the fear of reinjury prevent you from participating in the activities you love.

Injury Prevention in Flint Hill, MO. Whether you’re an athlete and want to up your game, or a recent retiree who wants to spend more time hiking, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the activities you love. While our professional Flint Hill, 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 show you techniques 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 Flint Hill, MO people’s lives. Many of us participate in activities like playing sports, hiking, and more. Furthermore, committing to an active lifestyle reduces the risk of serious health problems like type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, degenerative brain diseases, depression, and many types of cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Flint Hill, MO physical therapists help you come back even stronger after an injury, but our injury prevention professionals can help you reduce the risk of further injury by improving your overall strength, flexibility, and posture. All of our treatment plans, for both recovery and injury prevention, have been prove to work and are developed uniquely for each client and the level of activity they want to reach.

If you’ve recently suffered an injury, or have a nagging injury that just won’t go away, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location nearest you in Flint Hill, MO for a complimentary injury screening. To take preventative measures and protect your sport or hobby, keep reading or inquire about an appointment today.

Injuries Axes PT Can Help Prevent in Flint Hill, MO

Injuries typically happen for one of two reasons:

  1. Repetitive motion injuries are injuries that occur when a part of the body repeats the same motion time and time again. They are common in overhead athletes athletes who are required to repeat throwing or striking motions and typically reveal themselves with joint pain.
  2. Acute injuries are sudden and spontaneous. Examples include falling or receiving a blow. These can result in bruises, sprains and strains, fractures, and dislocations.

Some of the injuries we see most frequently, for example rotator cuff tears, can result from either overuse or acute trauma. Other injuries, for example ACL tears, are almost always the result of trauma, with an immediate impact to or twisting of the knee.

Injury Prevention Flint Hill, MO | Sports Therapy | Physical Therapy Near Flint Hill

Why Do Injuries Happen? | Injury Prevention in Flint Hill, MO

While injuries can happen in a variety of circumstances, and some are inescapable, they generally happen because of dysfunction or instability and your body and between body parts. There are three chief causes of why your body cannot adjust to an activity:

Muscle Imbalance

Muscle balance is key to supporting joints and reducing injury. Imbalance can result in overemphasis for one muscle group, which may cause your body to use it in a way it shouldn’t. It also causes posture dysfunction, and the weaker set of muscles will be pushed past its limit, resulting in failure and a higher probability of injury. Muscle imbalance applies to inadequate muscle balance in relation to other muscle groups, such as having a strong hamstring and weak quadriceps, or in the same muscle group, such as the four muscles in the rotator cuff not having proportionate strength. Muscle imbalance can cause injury through:

Personalized injury prevention with our professional physical therapists in Flint Hill, MO will ensure that your muscles are at optimal proportional strength.

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can impact your stability and impede your body’s ability to naturally perform functional movements, increasing your risk of injury. Neurological issues, swelling, previous injuries, and muscle imbalance call all contribute to movement dysfunction. It can cause injury through:

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

When you initially see our injury prevention experts in Flint Hill, MO, we’ll discuss your medical records and analyze your current movement health, strength, and flexibility. Then, alongside with your physician or any other medical professionals treating you, we’ll devise a customized plan of attack been proven to work through research and studies to get your movement health to reach its potential.

Posture Dysfunction

Bad posture is not just an issue for people who spend a lot of time doing the same activity. Athletes and other physically active people can have postural dysfunction when lying down, driving, or in specific stances related to a given activity. Optimal posture means proper alignments when both static and moving in a way that keeps the spine within its natural curves. Poor posture can compact the vertebrae, which interferes with our body’s ability to communicate with itself and attain optimal movement health. Symptoms include:

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

By guiding you to ideal posture, we’ll aid in your injury prevention by ensuring you are using your muscles equally, your flexibility is not jeopardized, and your nervous system can communicate as its intended to.



How to Prevent Injury in Flint Hill, MO

All sports and physical activities carry an inherent risk of injury. No one safety tip 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 in overworked bodies. If you have a very high activity level, make sure to take one or two days off per week to encourage your body to naturally heal any mild pain or soreness. If you have a more modest activity level, relax for the rest of the day after an activity so your muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints become too fatigued.
  • Wear protective equipment — Helmets, shin guards, elbow pads, and other equipment necessary in many sports can help prevent injuries like contusions or head injuries. If you’ve had a previous injury, your Flint Hill, MO doctor or injury prevention specialist may suggest braces or Kinesio Taping® to stabilize a joint. Other methods like making sure all the equipment is snug offers further protection.
  • Increase muscle strength — Strengthening your muscles, tendons, and ligaments helps them withstand the rigors your body is put through in sports and other activities. In your personalized injury prevention program with our professional Flint Hill, MO physical therapists, we’ll work to achieve ideal muscle balance and strengthen the often forgotten muscles needed to safely participate in the activities you love.
  • Enhance flexibility — Increasing your flexibility achieves three critical things for injury prevention:
    1. It boosts your range of motion, which allows for your soft tissue to adjust to more extreme positions.
    2. It increases circulation, which allows for nourishing blood to flow to your soft tissue, removing waste byproduct and encouraging the muscles to recover.
    3. It increases your posture, which we already know is an an important part of injury prevention.

    According to a peer-reviewed sports medicine paper, sports like football that require sudden twists and movements require muscles and tendons compliant enough to perform those movements. Stretching and warm up exercises before activities further helps prevent injuries.

  • Use accepted technique — Through the years, each sport and physical activity develops a consensus of the best techniques to use. These techniques not only help you get be the best player 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 concussion, and rotational athletes like golfers and baseball players learn how to best apply torque to your body. We utilize DorsaVi video motion analysis to slow down your movement and educate you on how to improve it.
  • Listen to your body — If a part of your body is bothering you, that means that body part is telling your brain that something is wrong. If you feel a sudden crack or grinding sensation, stop immediately 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 — Even though playing through pain is often viewed as a valiant act 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 much longer than if you had sat out at the time of the injury. Depending on the nature of your injury, you may use methods like the R.I.C.E. method, seeing your doctor, and scheduling appointments with a physical therapist to make sure your body heals properly and can withstand a return to physical activity.
  • Follow the rules — Depending on the sport or activity and age level of the participants, it likely has special rules to reduce the risk of injury. Penalties for helmet to helmet hits in football, rules against coming from behind in soccer, and even the presence of special lanes on the street and sidewalk for bikers are examples of rules put in place to prevent injuries to ourselves and others. There’s a reason those rules exist, and a reason that violations of those rules are punished.
  • Speak a licensed physical therapist — It’s always advisable to have a medical evaluation before another season begins or committing yourself to any strenuous activity or training regimen. While there, inquire with your doctor if injury prevention with a experienced physical therapist in Flint Hill, MO is something you should consider. Every treatment plan we employ has been proven to reduce the risk of injury, and we’ll personalize your program to your age, your injury history, and how physically active you wish to be.

Injury Prevention Flint Hill, MO | Sports Therapy | Physical Therapy Near Flint Hill

Injury Prevention for Senior Citizens in Flint Hill, MO

Falls in the elderly were responsible for more than 3 million urgent care visits and more than 34,000 fatalities. Studies show that being physical active is a great method for reducing the risk of falls. Other conditions that limit mobility such as arthritis that develop over the course of several years can be slowed down by physical therapy exercises that keep your muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints healthy. While the physical demands for older adults may not be as high as an athlete, the same principles of strength, balance, flexibility, and ideal posture can greatly aid in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Flint Hill, MO include:

Flint Hill, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Suffering in injury in something you love doing can create a mental block that won’t allow us to experience the same euphoria. The licensed Flint Hill, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to develop your personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body prepared for the rigors of physical activity, and your mind confident that you do not have to fear going back to what you love. You deserve to feel the physical and mental health benefits that you once valued so much. Make an appointment online or reach out to the location nearest you to start your program with one of our injury prevention experts in Flint Hill, MO.

Services Offered

Services Offered
  • Physical Therapy
    • Pre/Post Surgical Rehabilitation
    • Acute Injury Management
    • Chronic Injury Management
  • Work Conditioning/Hardening
  • Functional Capacity Evaluations
  • Certified Hand Therapy
  • Sports Physical Therapy
  • Pediatric Orthopedic Physical Therapy
  • Geriatric Physical Therapy
  • Instrument Assisted Soft Tissue Mobilization
  • DorsaVi Video Motion Analysis
  • Spine Specialty – Certified Manual Therapy, McKenzie
  • Free Injury Screenings
  • Kinesio Taping®
  • Blood Flow Restriction Therapy

Our Team

Sara Crain
PT, CEAS, Astym Cert.
Julie Freiner
OTR/L, CHT
Samantha Bixby
PT, DPT, Astym Cert.
Farren Holman
PT, DPT, Astym Cert.
Matt Williams
MS, OTR/L, ATC/L, CHT
Jeff Hunter
Clinic Director, PT, Cert. MDT, MBA
Bailey Zimmermann
Front Office Supervisor
Amanda Reynolds
Front Office

Locations

Begin Your Recovery Today

Injuries and pain shouldn’t keep you from moving and doing the things you love.