Injury Prevention in Pevely, MO. Whether you’re an athlete trying to get an opportunity at the next level, 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 Pevely, MO physical therapists spend much of their time helping athletes and others heal after an injury, we are complete movement health specialists who can evaluate your movement, muscle and joint strength, and flexibility to show you exercises that are proven to reduce the risk of injury by preparing your body for the stressors of your desired activity. Request an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or contact the location nearest you.

Physical activity is vitally important to many Pevely, MO residents. Many of us participate in active endeavors like playing sports, biking, or other physical activities. Furthermore, keeping an active lifestyle reduces the risk of future health problems like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, dementia, mental health issues, and many types of cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Pevely, MO physical therapists allow you to come back and perform even better than before, but our injury prevention professionals can help preserve your active lifestyle by optimizing your overall movement health. All of our treatment plans, for both recovery and injury prevention, have been prove to work and are customized for each client and the lifestyle they desire.

If you’ve recently sustained an injury, or have a persistent injury that is not getting better with time, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location nearest you in Pevely, MO for a no-risk, no-obligation injury screening. To take preventative measures and ensure that you can continue with your sport or hobby, read on below or call to speak to a physical therapist today.

Types of Injuries We Prevent Prevent in Pevely, MO

Injuries typically happen for one of two reasons:

1. Repetitive demand injuries are injuries happen gradually as a body part degrades because of repetitive movements. In sports, we see them the most in in overhead athletes such as water polo or volleyball players, with joint pain usually being the first warning sign.
2. Acute injuries are injuries that happen suddenly. Examples include falling or receiving a blow. These can result in bruises, twisting joints, broken bones, and dislocations.

Some common injuries, for example rotator cuff tears, can either develop over time or occur suddenly. Other injuries, like ACL tears, almost always occur spontaneously, with a sudden impact to the knee.

What Causes Injuries? | Injury Prevention in Pevely, MO

While injuries occur for many different reasons, and some are unpreventable, they generally occur 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 essential to maintaining healthy joints and reducing injury. Imbalance can cause an overreliance on one muscle group, which may cause your body to force it to participate in an activity it shouldn’t. It also prevents you from having ideal 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 poor muscle balance between muscle groups, such as having a strong chest and weak back, or within muscle groups, such as an imbalance between the four muscles of the rotator cuff. Muscle imbalance can cause injury through:

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

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

Movement Dysfunction

Movement dysfunction can impact your stability and lead to your body bending in unnatural ways, increasing your risk of injury. Problems in your nervous system, swelling, previous injuries, and muscle imbalance call all contribute to movement dysfunction. Symptoms include:

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

When you initially visit our injury prevention experts in Pevely, MO, we’ll discuss your medical history and perform a base evaluation to identify the root causes of your movement dysfunction. Then, in concert with with your doctor or any additional providers involved in your care, we’ll come up with a customized game plan based on empirically-backed research and studies to get your movement back on track.

Posture Dysfunction

Bad posture is not just an issue for people who spend a lot of time doing the same activity. Athletes and others with active lifestyles can have postural dysfunction when resting, sitting, or in specific positions related to their sport. Correct posture means proper alignments of your body from your head to your toes in a way that keeps the spine within its natural curves. Poor posture can bring the joints in the spine closer together, which disrupts communication between your brain and body and makes it challenging to achieve ideal motion health. It can also lead to:

• 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 can be improved and maintained, and your vertebrae remain in place.

Keys to Injury Prevention in Pevely, MO

You can still suffer an injury even if you did everything possible to reduce that risk. We cannot promise that our injury prevention program completely negates the risk of injury. However, there are precautions 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 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 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 correct equipment — Helmets, chin straps, protective eyewear, and other equipment necessary in sports and other activities helps you avoid injuries such as bruises or head injuries. If you’ve had a previous injury, your Pevely, MO doctor or physical therapist may recommend braces or Kinesio Taping® to stabilize the affected area. Other methods like making sure all the equipment is snug can further help injury prevention by stabilizing your joints.
• Strengthen muscles — Strengthening soft tissue helps it stand up to the force and torque of heavy activity. In your tailored injury prevention program with our experienced Pevely, MO physical therapists, we’ll work to build up your body to be able to avoid injury in the activities you love.
• Enhance flexibility — Increasing your flexibility contributes to injury prevention in three way:
  1. It improves 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 forceful movements.
  2. It improves circulation, which allows for protein-rich blood to flow to your muscles, eliminating waste byproduct and reinvigorating the muscles.
  3. It encourages good posture, which we already know is an is one of the most important factors of injury prevention.

  According to research, sports like basketball that include sudden twists and movements require soft tissue with sufficient flexibility 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 player you can be but help prevent injuries. Football players learn to tackle a certain way to avoid 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 educate you on how to improve it.
• Listen to your body — 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 get the appropriate medical treatment. If your body isn’t holing up well in an intense workout, don’t force it.
• Don’t play through an injury — While gutting it out through pain is often viewed as a courageous act among competitors, forcing your body to perform with soft tissue or structural damage could exacerbate a current injury and leave you off the field or court 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 an emergency room, and a series of physical therapy sessions to ensure your body heals naturally and can handle 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 in the interest of safety. Penalties for helmet to helmet hits in football, rules against coming from behind in soccer, and even the existence of bike lanes 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 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 activity or training regimen. While there, ask your doctor if injury prevention with a professional physical therapist in Pevely, MO is a good idea for you. All of our techniques have been demonstrated to help athletes remain healthy, and you plan will be completely unique to you and catered to your age, your injury history, and which activities you want to participate in.

Injury Prevention for Older Pevely, MO Adults

Falls in the elderly were responsible for more than 3 million urgent care visits and more than 34,000 deaths. Research demonstrates that physical activity can go a long way in preventing falls. Other conditions that limit mobility like arthritis that accumulate over time can be slowed down by physical therapy exercises that keep your soft tissue and joints active. While seniors typically do not exert themselves as much as an athlete does, the same principles of strength, balance, flexibility, and proper posture can greatly aid in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Pevely, 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

Pevely, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Suffering in injury in something you love doing causes a mental block that keeps us from experiencing the same exhilaration. The experienced Pevely, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to design for you a personalized injury prevention program that will keep your body prepared for the rigors of physical activity, 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 of doing what you do best. Request an appointment online or reach out to the location nearest you to start your program with one of our injury prevention professionals in Pevely, MO.