Injury Prevention in Innsbrook, 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 happy, healthy lifestyle you desire. While our certified Innsbrook, MO physical therapists work extensively with athletes and others to heal after an injury, we are complete movement health specialists who can evaluate your body’s current condition and how you move to teach out exercises that are proven to reduce the risk of injury. Schedule an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or contact the location most convenient for you.

Being physically active is an essential part of many Innsbrook, MO people’s lives. We love activities like playing sports, hiking, and more. Additionally, pursuing an active lifestyle helps prevent future health problems such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, dementia, anxiety, and certain cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Innsbrook, MO physical therapists allow you to come back even stronger after an injury, but our injury prevention specialists can help keep you active by optimizing your overall movement health. All of our methods, both when helping restore motion health and when looking to improve it, are proven to be effective and are personalized to each client and the level of activity they want to reach.

If you’ve recently sustained an injury, or have a nagging injury that won’t heal on its own, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location nearest you in Innsbrook, 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 Innsbrook, MO

Most injuries happen for one of two reasons:

1. Wear-and-tear injuries are injuries that are caused by repetitive movements over time. In sports, we see them the most in in overhead athletes such as softball or lacrosse players and typically reveal themselves with joint pain.
2. Acute injuries are injuries that happen suddenly. Examples include falling or receiving a blow. These can result in bruises, sprains and strains, broken bones, and dislocations.

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

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

While anyone can suffer an injury almost at any time and for numerous different reasons, they generally happen because your muscles, ligaments, tendons, bones, and joints cannot handle the force, torque, or stretching that they are subjected to in a given movement or collision. There are three common dysfunctions that lead to injury:

Muscle Imbalance

Muscle balance is key to maintaining healthy joints and staving off injury. Imbalance can lead to dependency on one muscle group, which may cause your body to force it to participate in an activity it shouldn’t. 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 inadequate muscle balance between muscle groups, such as having a strong bicep and weak tricep, or in the same muscle group, such as an imbalance between the four muscles of the rotator cuff. Muscle imbalance can result in:

• Muscle weakness
• Muscle inflexibility
• Poor muscle recruitment
• Poor coordination

Tailored injury prevention with our professional physical therapists in Innsbrook, MO will ensure that different muscles and muscle groups are equally strong.

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can impact your stability and impede your body’s ability to naturally perform functional movements, causing injury. Problems in your nervous system, inflammation, previous injuries, and muscle imbalance call all contribute to movement dysfunction. It can lead to:

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

When you first visit our injury prevention specialists in Innsbrook, MO, we’ll go over your medical history and perform a base evaluation to identify the root causes of your movement dysfunction. Then, alongside with your physician or any other medical professionals involved in your treatment, we’ll design a customized treatment plan based on empirically-backed research and studies to get your body moving as it should.

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 at lest, driving, or in certain stances necessary for their sport. Good posture refers to proper alignments of the different joints and muscles of your body in a way that keeps the spine within its natural curves. Poor posture can compact the joints in the spine, which has a negative affect on our body’s ability to communicate with itself and reach optimal motion health. It causes injuries through:

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

Good posture is a vital part of injury prevention because it ensures 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.

How to Prevent Injury in Innsbrook, MO

All sports and physical activities carry an inherent risk of injury. We cannot promise that our injury prevention program completely negates the risk of injury. However, there are things you can do to make sure your body is strong and flexible enough for your intended activity:

• Take breaks — Your body needs time to rest and recover after any moderate to intense activity. If you’re heavily active, 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 you don’t overwork your muscles and joints.
• Use the correct equipment — Helmets, shin guards, elbow pads, and other recommended equipment in many sports can help prevent injuries like contusions or head injuries. If you’ve already suffered an injury to a joint or muscle, tendon, or ligament, your Innsbrook, MO physician or physical therapist may advise braces or Kinesio Taping® to stabilize a joint. Other techniques like making sure all the equipment is snug can further help injury prevention by stabilizing your joints.
• Strengthen muscles — Strengthening soft tissue helps it withstand the force and torque necessary for in sports and other activities. Our Innsbrook, MO injury prevention specialists will work to achieve ideal muscle balance and strengthen the smaller muscles needed to safely participate in the activities you want to participate in.
• Boost flexibility — Increasing your flexibility accomplishes three important things for injury prevention:
  1. It improves your range of motion, which lets for your tendons and ligaments to handle more pronounced movements.
  2. It enhances circulation, which allows for protein-rich blood to flow to your soft tissue, eliminating waste byproduct and encouraging the muscles to restore themselves.
  3. It increases your posture, which we already know is an an essential part of injury prevention.

  According to a peer-reviewed sports medicine paper, sports like football that necessitate sudden twists and movements require muscles and tendons with sufficient flexibility to perform those movements. Stretching and warm up exercises before games or training further helps prevent injuries.

• Use accepted technique — In every sport, there is an accepted way to position and move your body. These techniques not only help you perform better but help prevent injuries. Football players learn to tackle a certain way to avoid brain damage, and swimmers learn the proper strokes to use the appropriate muscles. We utilize DorsaVi video motion analysis to capture how you move and evaluate how to improve it.
• Don’t ignore what your body is telling you — If you feel pain in a muscle or joint, your body is trying to send you a message. 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, save it for another day.
• Don’t play through an injury — Even though teammates, competitors, and fans appreciate an athlete that guts it out through pain, forcing your body to perform with an injury to a muscle, joint, tendon, or ligament could make that injury worse and put you out of commission for much longer than you would have been sitting out. Depending on the nature of your injury, you may use methods like the R.I.C.E. method, visiting your doctor, and rehab with a physical therapist to make sure your recovery and return to action go as well as possible.
• Play by the rules — Depending on the sport or activity and age level of the participants, it likely has special rules to help prevent injury. Penalties for helmet to helmet hits in football, rules against slide-tackling in soccer, and even the existence of bike lanes 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 violations of those rules are punished.
• Consult a professional physical therapist — It’s always advisable to see a doctor before another season begins or starting up a new activity or training regimen. During your appointment, ask your doctor if injury prevention with a knowledgeable physical therapist in Innsbrook, MO is right for you. All of our techniques have been proven to help athletes remain healthy, and we’ll personalize your program to how old you are, any previous injuries, and which activities you want to participate in.

Injury Prevention for The Elderly in Innsbrook, MO

Falls in senior citizens were responsible for over 3 million emergency room admissions and over 34,000 deaths. Research demonstrates that physical activity is invaluable in reducing the risk of falls. Other conditions like arthritis that are wear and tear injuries can be more bearable and take longer to progress with physical therapy exercises that keep your soft tissue and joints strong. While seniors typically do not exert themselves as much as an athlete does, the same principles of strength, balance, flexibility, and optimal posture are great agents in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Innsbrook, MO include:

• 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
• Hip Replacement Physical Therapy

Innsbrook, 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 happiness. The experienced Innsbrook, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to guide you through your own personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body as safe and healthy as can be, and your mind at ease 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. Request an appointment online or contact the location nearest you to learn more about what our Innsbrook, MO injury prevention specialists can do for you.