Lake St. Louis, MO

Lake St. Louis, MO

Don't let the fear of reinjury keep you from the activities you love.

Injury Prevention in Lake St. Louis, MO. Whether you’re an athlete and want to up your game, or you just retired and want to dedicate your time to hiking, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the activities you love. While our certified Lake St. Louis, MO physical therapists work extensively with athletes and others to recover from injury, we are experts in the entire musculoskeletal system who can evaluate your body’s current condition and how you move to guide you through measures that are proven to reduce the risk of injury. Schedule an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or reach out to the location most convenient for you.

Physical activity is an essential part of many Lake St. Louis, MO people’s lives. We love activities like playing sports, hiking, and more. Additionally, pursuing an active lifestyle helps prevent future health problems like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, degenerative brain diseases, anxiety, and certain cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Lake St. Louis, MO physical therapists allow you to return to action even stronger after an injury, but our injury prevention professionals can help keep you active by improving your overall strength, flexibility, and posture. All of our treatment plans, for both healing from and preventing injury, are proven to be effective and are personalized to each client and the lifestyle they desire.

If you’ve recently suffered an injury, or have a persistent injury that won’t heal on its own, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location most convenient for you in Lake St. Louis, MO for a complimentary injury screening. To reduce your chance of an injury and protect your sport or hobby, read on below or call to speak to a physical therapist at your earliest convenience.

Types of Injuries We Prevent Prevent in Lake St. Louis, MO

Injuries typically 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 typically reveal themselves with joint pain.
  2. Acute injuries are injuries that happen suddenly. 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, like rotator cuff tears, can result from either overuse or acute trauma. Other injuries, for example ACL tears, almost always occur spontaneously, with a sudden impact to the knee.

Injury Prevention Lake St. Louis, MO | Sports Therapy | Physical Therapy Near Lake St. Louis

Why Do Injuries Happen? | Injury Prevention in Lake St. Louis, MO

While anyone can suffer an injury almost at any time and for numerous different reasons, they generally occur because your soft tissue, 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 reducing injury. Imbalance can cause an overreliance on 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 likelihood of injury. Muscle imbalance can refer to inadequate muscle balance between muscle groups, such as having a strong hamstring and weak quadriceps, or within muscle groups, such as the four muscles in the rotator cuff having different levels of strength. Muscle imbalance can result in:

Customized injury prevention with our professional physical therapists in Lake St. Louis, MO will ensure that your muscles are at optimal proportional strength.

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can result in poor balance and lead to your body bending in ways it is not designed to, causing injury. It can be caused by many different musculoskeletal issues. Symptoms include:

  • Joint mobility limitations
  • Muscle imbalance
  • Coordination deficits
  • Reduced balance

At our initial injury prevention appointment in Lake St. Louis, MO, we’ll go over your medical records and analyze your current movement health, strength, and flexibility. Then, alongside with your doctor or any other providers treating you, we’ll come up with a customized treatment 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 who spend a lot of time doing the same activity. People who play sports and others with active lifestyles can have postural dysfunction when lying down, using the computer, or in specific poses related to a given activity. Correct posture refers to proper positioning of the neck, torso, pelvis, and extremities in a way that encourages our spine to stay in its natural curves. Poor posture can compact the vertebrae, which disrupts your nervous system and makes it challenging to reach ideal movement health. It causes injuries through:

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

By teaching you correct 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 vertebrae remain in place.



Keys to Injury Prevention in Lake St. Louis, MO

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

  • Take a rest — Your body needs time to rest and recover after any moderate to intense activity. If you’re heavily active, one or two rest days a week will encourage your body to engage in its natural healing processes. If you have a more moderate activity level, take it easy for the few hours after an activity so you don’t overwork your muscles and joints.
  • Wear the right equipment — Helmets, chest guards, protective eyewear, and other equipment necessary in sports and other activities can help prevent injuries such as rashes or brain injuries. If you’ve already suffered an injury to a joint or muscle, tendon, or ligament, your Lake St. Louis, 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 your muscles, tendons, and ligaments helps them withstand the rigors of heavy activity. In your tailored injury prevention program with our professional Lake St. Louis, MO physical therapists, we’ll work to build up your body to safely participate in the activities you want to participate in.
  • Boost flexibility — Increasing your flexibility contributes to injury prevention in three way:
    1. It enhances which movements you can make and how far you can extend them, which allows for the tendons and ligaments connecting your muscles to your bones to adapt to more dramatic movements.
    2. It boosts circulation, which carries protein-rich blood to your muscles, eliminating waste byproduct and encouraging the muscles to restore themselves.
    3. It encourages good posture, which, as we’ve discussed, is an essential part of injury prevention.

    According to research, sports like football that necessitate bouncing and jumping require soft tissue compliant enough to perform those movements. Also, it’s important to stretch and warm up before any physical activity to further reduce the risk of injury.

  • Use accepted technique — In every physical activity, there are accepted techniques to use. These techniques not only improve performance but help prevent injuries. Football players are taught to tackle with the shoulder in order to avoid 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 break down your movement and educate you on how to both improve your performance and prevent injury.
  • Listen to your body — If you feel pain in a muscle or joint, that means that body part is telling your brain that something is wrong. If you feel something suddenly that doesn’t feel right, immediately stop all physical activity and seek proportional medical care. If your body does not feel well enough for a particularly rigorous training session, don’t force it.
  • Don’t play through an injury — Even though gritting through pain is often seen as commendable among competitors, forcing your body to perform with soft tissue or structural damage could aggravate a current injury and put you out of commission for much longer than if you had sat out at the time of the injury. 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 body heals properly and can withstand the activity you want to return to.
  • Follow the rules — Many sports have special rules at different levels to help prevent injury. Penalties for leading with the helmet in football, rules against slide-tackling in soccer, and even the existence of special lanes on the street and sidewalk for bikers are all rules that leagues enacted to keep participants safe. Those are in place for a reason, and there’s a reason that there are penalties for them.
  • Speak a licensed physical therapist — It’s in your best interest to get a physical before a new season or committing yourself to any strenuous physical activity. While there, ask your doctor if injury prevention with a knowledgeable physical therapist in Lake St. Louis, MO is something you should consider. All of our techniques have been demonstrated to prevent injury, and we’ll personalize your program to how old you are, any previous injuries, and how physically active you wish to be.

Injury Prevention Lake St. Louis, MO | Sports Therapy | Physical Therapy Near Lake St. Louis

Injury Prevention for Older Lake St. Louis, MO Adults

Falls in senior citizens were responsible for over 3 million emergency room admissions and more than 34,000 deaths. Research demonstrates that physical activity is invaluable in preventing falls. Other conditions such as arthritis that accumulate over time can be more bearable and take longer to progress with physical therapy exercises that keep your muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints healthy. While seniors typically do not exert themselves as much as an athlete does, healthy strength, balance, flexibility, and correct posture can greatly aid in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Lake St. Louis, MO include:

Lake St. Louis, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Suffering in injury 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 Lake St. Louis, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to design for you a personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body strong and flexible, and your mind at ease that you do not have to fear going back to what you love doing most. We will aid you in feeling 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 get started with one of our injury prevention specialists in Lake St. Louis, 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 Coming Soon
  • Sports Physical Therapy
  • Pediatric Orthopedic Physical Therapy
  • Geriatric Physical Therapy
  • Instrument Assisted Soft Tissue Mobilization
  • Vestibular Therapy and Post-Concussion Rehabilitation
  • Trigger Point Dry Needling
  • Free Injury Screenings
  • Kinesio Taping®
  • Blood Flow Restriction Therapy

Our Team

Sara Crain
PT, CEAS, Astym Cert.
Julie Freiner
OTR/L, CHT
Matt Williams
MS, OTR/L, ATC/L, CHT
Brian Freund
Partner, DPT, CMPT, TPS, MBA
Kaysie Cope
Front Office
Lauren Vaughn
PT, DPT, CMPT, Astym Cert.
Kelly Thornton
Clinic Director, PT, DPT
Justin Bridwell
Front Office

Locations

Begin Your Recovery Today

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