Injury Prevention in Mackenzie, MO. Whether you’re an athlete hoping for a shot at the next stage, or a recent retiree who wants to spend more time taking ski vacations, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the happy, healthy lifestyle you desire. While our licensed Mackenzie, 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 movement, muscle and joint strength, and flexibility to teach out measures that are proven to prevent injury. Make an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or call the location most convenient for you.

Physical activity is vitally important to many Mackenzie, MO residents. We love activities like playing sports, swimming, or other physical activities. Furthermore, keeping an active lifestyle helps prevent chronic conditions like type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, degenerative brain diseases, anxiety, and many types of cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Mackenzie, MO physical therapists help you come back even stronger after an injury, but our injury prevention specialists can help preserve your active lifestyle by improving your overall strength, flexibility, and posture. All of our methods, both when helping restore motion health and when looking to improve it, are based on evidence-backed techniques and are developed uniquely for each client and the level of activity they want to reach.

If you’ve recently sustained an injury, or have a nagging injury that is not getting better with time, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location most convenient for you in Mackenzie, MO for a free injury screening. To reduce your chance of an injury and protect your sport or hobby, keep reading or call to speak to a physical therapist at your earliest convenience.

Injuries Axes PT Can Help Prevent in Mackenzie, MO

Injuries typically happen for one of two reasons:

1. Wear-and-tear 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, with joint pain usually being the first warning sign.
2. Acute injuries are sudden and spontaneous. Examples include landing on uneven ground 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, such as ACL tears, almost always occur spontaneously, with a sudden impact to the knee.

What Causes Injuries? | Injury Prevention in Mackenzie, MO

While injuries occur for many different reasons, and are sometimes inescapable, 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 primary causes of why your body cannot adjust to an activity:

Muscle Imbalance

Muscle balance is crucial to supporting joints and staving off injury. Imbalance can lead to an overreliance on one set of muscles, causing it to perform actions it cannot do safely. It can also lead to poor posture, and one set of muscles becoming fatigued sooner, increasing the risk of injury. Injuries can be caused by insufficient muscle balance between muscle groups, such as having a strong hamstring and weak quadriceps, or in the same muscle group, such as an imbalance between the four muscles of the rotator cuff. Symptoms include:

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

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

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can impact your stability and impede your body’s ability to naturally perform functional movements, causing injury. It can be caused by a range of musculoskeletal issues. It can cause injury through:

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

At our initial injury prevention appointment in Mackenzie, MO, we’ll go through your medical history and perform a base evaluation to identify the root causes of your movement dysfunction. Then, together with your physician or any other medical professionals involved in your care, we’ll come up with a customized plan of attack based on empirically-backed research and studies to get your movement back on track.

Posture Dysfunction

Bad posture doesn’t just affect people with slouched shoulders. People who play sports and other physically active people can be affected by postural dysfunction when resting, sitting, or in specific positions related to their sport. Correct posture means correct positioning when both static and moving in a way that keeps the spine within its natural curves. Poor posture can bring the bones of the spine closer together, which has a negative affect on our body’s ability to communicate with itself and reach ideal 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 muscle balance, flexibility, and that your spine is in its natural position.

Keys to Injury Prevention in Mackenzie, MO

All sports and physical activities carry an inherent risk of injury. No one precaution is 100% foolproof in injury prevention. However, there are precautions to make sure your body is prepared for your intended activity:

• 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 signal to your body to engage in its natural healing processes. If you’re moderately active, take a break after activity so you don’t overwork your muscles and joints.
• Wear the right equipment — Helmets, chest guards, protective eyewear, and other required equipment in many sports helps you avoid injuries such as contusions or brain injuries. If you’re returning to activity after an injury, your Mackenzie, MO doctor or injury prevention professional may fit you for stabilizing braces or Kinesio Taping®. Other techniques like tying your athletic footwear tightly can further help injury prevention by stabilizing your joints.
• Boost muscle strength — Strengthening your muscles, tendons, and ligaments helps them withstand the force and torque necessary for in sports and other activities. In your tailored injury prevention program with our experienced Mackenzie, MO physical therapists, we’ll work to build up your body to be able to avoid injury in the activities you want to participate in.
• Enhance flexibility — Increasing your flexibility contributes to injury prevention in three way:
  1. It enhances your range of motion, which lets for your soft tissue to adjust to more forceful movements.
  2. It improves circulation, which carries protein-rich blood to your muscles, removing waste byproduct and re-energizing the muscles.
  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 soccer that include dynamic motions require muscles and tendons flexible enough to perform those movements. Stretching and warm up exercises before activities further helps prevent injuries.

• Use proper 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 athlete you can be but help prevent injuries. Football players learn 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 use DorsaVi video motion analysis to slow down your movement and evaluate how to both improve your performance and prevent injury.
• Don’t ignore what your body is telling you — 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 something suddenly that doesn’t feel right, stop immediately and get the appropriate medical treatment. If your body isn’t holing up well in a particularly rigorous workout, don’t force it.
• Don’t play through an injury — Even though gritting through pain is often seen as a courageous act among competitors, playing with soft tissue or structural damage could exacerbate an existing injury and leave you on the sidelines for much longer than if you had sat out at the time of the injury. Depending on the severity of your injury, you may use methods like the R.I.C.E. method, seeing your doctor, and a series of physical therapy sessions to make sure your body heals properly and can handle a return to physical activity.
• Play by the rules — Many sports have special rules at different levels in the interest of safety. 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 that leagues enacted to prevent injuries to ourselves and others. There’s a reason those rules exist, and a reason that violations of those rules are punished.
• Consult a professional physical therapist — It’s in your best interest to see a doctor before starting another season or starting up a new physical activity. During your appointment, inquire with your doctor if injury prevention with a experienced physical therapist in Mackenzie, MO is something you should consider. All of our techniques have been demonstrated to help athletes remain healthy, 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 Senior Citizens in Mackenzie, MO

Falls in adults over 65 accounted for over 3 million emergency room visits and more than 34,000 fatalities. Studies show that being physical active is invaluable in reducing the risk of falls. Other conditions that limit mobility like arthritis that are wear and tear injuries can be slowed down by physical therapy exercises that keep your muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints healthy. While older adults typically do not exert themselves as much as an athlete does, appropriate strength, balance, flexibility, and good posture can greatly aid in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Mackenzie, MO include:

• Stroke Rehabilitation
• Hip Replacement Physical Therapy
• Workers Comp' Physical Therapy
• Migraine Relief
• Sprain and Strain Treatment
• Geriatric Physical Therapy
• Injury Rehabilitation
• Pain Management Services
• TMJ Treatment
• Herniated Disc Treatment

Mackenzie, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Being injured in one of your favorite activities can lead to a mental block that keeps us from experiencing the same joy. The licensed Mackenzie, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to develop your personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body strong and flexible, 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 once valued so much. Make an appointment online or contact the location nearest you to start your program with one of our injury prevention professionals in Mackenzie, MO.