Injury Prevention in Troy, MO. Whether you’re an athlete and want to up your game, or a recent retiree who wants to spend more time bike riding, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the happy, healthy lifestyle you desire. While our certified Troy, 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 show you measures that are proven to prevent injury. Make an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or contact the location nearest you.

Physical activity is vitally important to many Troy, MO residents. We love active endeavors such as playing sports, playing golf, or other physical activities. Additionally, pursuing an active lifestyle reduces the risk of chronic conditions like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, degenerative brain diseases, depression, and certain cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Troy, MO physical therapists allow you to come back and perform even better than before, but our injury prevention experts can help keep you active by optimizing your overall movement health. All of our methods, for both healing from and preventing injury, 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 lingering injury that just won’t go away, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location nearest you in Troy, MO for a no-risk, no-obligation injury screening. To reduce your chance of an injury and ensure that you can continue with your active lifestyle, keep reading or call to speak to a physical therapist today.

Injuries Axes PT Can Help Prevent in Troy, MO

Most injuries happen for one of two reasons:

1. Wear-and-tear injuries are injuries that are caused by repetitive movements over time. They are common in overhead athletes athletes who use throwing or striking motions and typically manifest themselves as joint pain.
2. Acute injuries are sudden and spontaneous. Examples include falling or a sudden impact by an object or another person. These can result in bruises, twisting joints, fractures, and dislocations.

Some common injuries, such as rotator cuff tears, can either develop over time or occur suddenly. Other injuries, for example ACL tears, are almost always the result of trauma, with an immediate impact to or twisting of the knee.

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

While anyone can suffer an injury almost at any time and for numerous different reasons, they generally occur because your muscles, ligaments, tendons, bones, and joints cannot hold up under 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 key to supporting joints and preventing injury. Imbalance can lead to overemphasis for one muscle group, causing it to perform actions it cannot do safely. 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. Symptoms include:

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

Tailored injury prevention with our experienced physical therapists in Troy, 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, increasing your risk of injury. Neurological issues, swelling, previous injuries, and muscle imbalance call all contribute to movement dysfunction. Symptoms include:

• Joint mobility restrictions
• Muscle imbalance
• Coordination deficiency
• Lessened balance

At our initial injury prevention appointment in Troy, MO, we’ll evaluate your medical records and analyze your current movement health, strength, and flexibility. Then, together with your physician or any other providers involved in your care, we’ll come up with a tailored game 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 in the same position. Athletes and other physically active people can have postural dysfunction when resting, sitting, or in certain positions they need to be in for their sport. Correct posture refers to correct alignments of the neck, torso, pelvis, and extremities in a way that does not remove the spine from its natural curves. Poor posture can bring the vertebrae closer together, which has a negative affect on our body’s ability to communicate with itself and achieve ideal movement health. It can also lead to:

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

By guiding you to correct posture, we’ll aid in your injury prevention by ensuring muscle balance, flexibility, and that your vertebrae remain in place.

How to Prevent Injury in Troy, MO

You can still suffer an injury even if you did everything possible to reduce that risk. 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’re moderately active, rest for the rest of the day after an activity so your muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints become too fatigued.
• Wear the right equipment — Helmets, mouth guards, safety pads and guards, and other equipment necessary in sports and other activities helps you avoid injuries like contusions or concussions. If you’ve already suffered an injury to a joint or soft tissue, your Troy, MO doctor or physical therapist may advise braces or Kinesio Taping® to stabilize the affected area. Other techniques like tying your shoes tightly offers further stabilization.
• Strengthen muscles — Strengthening soft tissue helps it stand up to the force and torque your body is put through in sports and other activities. In your tailored injury prevention program with our expert Troy, 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 accomplishes three critical things for injury prevention:
  1. It enhances your range of motion, which allows for your tendons and ligaments to handle more pronounced movements.
  2. It increases circulation, which allows for nutrient-rich blood to flow to your muscles, removing waste byproduct and rebuilding 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 football that necessitate bouncing and jumping 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 proper technique — In every sport, there are accepted techniques to use. These techniques not only help you get be the best athlete you can be but help prevent injuries. Football players are taught to tackle a certain way to avoid brain damage, 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 analyze how to improve it.
• Listen to your body — If you feel pain in a muscle or joint, that means that body part is telling your brain that something isn’t right. If you feel something suddenly that doesn’t feel right, stop immediately and get the appropriate medical treatment. If your body isn’t feeling up to a particularly rigorous 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, playing with an injury to a muscle, joint, tendon, or ligament could aggravate an existing injury and put you out of commission for much longer than if you had sat out at the time of the injury. Depending on the severity of your injury, recommended actions may be using R.I.C.E. method, visiting urgent care, and a series of physical therapy sessions 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 in the interest of safety. Penalties for helmet to helmet hits in football, rules against slide-tackling in soccer, and even the presence of bike lanes are examples of rules put in place 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 licensed physical therapist — It’s a good idea to have a medical evaluation before another season begins or starting up a new activity or training regimen. While there, ask your doctor if injury prevention with a experienced physical therapist in Troy, MO is something you should consider. Every treatment plan we employ has been proven to prevent injury, and we’ll personalize your program to your age, your injury history, and which activities you want to participate in.

Injury Prevention for Senior Citizens in Troy, MO

Falls in senior citizens accounted for over 3 million emergency room visits and more than 34,000 deaths. Studies show that physical activity can go a long way in preventing falls. Other conditions that limit mobility such as arthritis that develop over the course of several years can be effectively managed with 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, healthy strength, stability, flexibility, and good posture are great agents in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Troy, MO include:

• Neck Pain Treatment
• 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

Troy, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Suffering in injury in one of your favorite activities can lead to a mental block that won’t allow us to experience the same joy. The professional Troy, MO physical therapists at Axes are here to develop your 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. 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 discover what our Troy, MO injury prevention experts can do for you.