Union, MO

Union, MO

Don't let the fear of reinjury prevent you from participating in the things what you do best.

Injury Prevention in Union, MO. Whether you’re an athlete and want to up your game, or you just retired and want to spend more time being physical fit, don’t let the fear of reinjury keep you from the activities you love. While our professional Union, MO physical therapists spend much of their time helping athletes and others heal after an injury, we are experts in the entire musculoskeletal system who can evaluate your movement, muscle and joint strength, and flexibility to guide you through measures that are proven to reduce the risk of injury. Schedule an appointment at Axes Physical Therapy today or call the location nearest you.

Being physically active is an essential part of many Union, MO people’s lives. Many of us participate in active endeavors such as playing sports, biking, and more. Furthermore, committing to an active lifestyle helps stave off significant health problems like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, eurodegenerative disease, depression, and many types of cancers. Not only can physical therapy with one of Axes’ licensed Union, MO physical therapists allow you to return to action as fierce as ever, but our injury prevention professionals can help you reduce the risk of further injury by improving your overall strength, flexibility, and posture. All of our methods, for both recovery and injury prevention, have been prove to work and are developed uniquely for each client and the level of activity they want to reach.

If you’ve recently suffered an injury, or have a persistent injury that is not getting better with time, contact the Axes Physical Therapy location nearest you in Union, MO for a complimentary injury screening. To reduce your chance of an injury and protect your sport or hobby, keep reading or inquire about an appointment at your earliest convenience.

Injuries Axes PT Can Help Prevent in Union, MO

Injuries typically happen for one of two reasons:

  1. Repetitive motion 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 tennis or volleyball players and commonly are accompanied by joint pain.
  2. Acute injuries are sudden and spontaneous. Examples include landing on uneven ground or receiving a blow. These can result in bruises, twisting joints, 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, are almost always the result of trauma, with an immediate impact to or twisting of the knee.

Injury Prevention Union, MO | Sports Therapy | Physical Therapy Near Union

What Causes Injuries? | Injury Prevention in Union, MO

While injuries occur for many different reasons, and some are unpreventable, they generally happen 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 handle an activity:

Muscle Imbalance

Muscle balance is crucial to supporting joints and reducing injury. Imbalance can lead to an overreliance on one set of muscles, causing it to perform actions it cannot do safely. It also prevents you from having good 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 insufficient muscle balance in relation to other muscle groups, such as having a strong bicep and weak tricep, or within muscle groups, such as an imbalance between the four muscles of the rotator cuff. Symptoms include:

Tailored injury prevention with our licensed physical therapists in Union, 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 many different musculoskeletal issues. Symptoms include:

  • Joint mobility restrictions
  • Muscle imbalance
  • Poor coordination
  • Lessened balance

When you first visit our injury prevention professionals in Union, MO, we’ll discuss your medical history and analyze your current movement health, strength, and flexibility. Then, alongside with your doctor or any other medical professionals treating you, we’ll design a personalized plan of attack been proven to work by research and studies to get your movement back on track.

Posture Dysfunction

Bad posture is not just an issue for people with desk jobs. People who play sports and other physically active people can have postural dysfunction when at lest, sitting, or in specific positions necessary for a given activity. Optimal posture refers to correct positioning of the different joints and muscles of your body in a way that keeps the spine within its natural curves. Poor posture can bring the vertebrae closer together, which disrupts your nervous system and makes it difficult to achieve the strength and range of motion you need to achieve. Symptoms include:

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

By teaching you the best practices for posture, we’ll aid in your injury prevention by ensuring muscle balance, flexibility, and that your spine is in its natural position.



Keys to Injury Prevention in Union, MO

All sports and physical activities can potentially lead to an injury. No one precaution is guaranteed to be effective in injury prevention. However, there are things you can do to make sure your body is strong and flexible enough for your desired activity level:

  • Take a rest — Injuries are more common when you do not give your body time to restore itself. If you’re heavily active, make sure to take one or two days off per week to signal to 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 protective equipment — Helmets, shin guards, elbow pads, and other equipment necessary in many sports can help prevent injuries such as bruises or concussions. If you’ve already suffered an injury to a joint or muscle, tendon, or ligament, your Union, MO doctor or injury prevention professional may fit you for stabilizing braces or Kinesio Taping®. Other techniques like tying your cleats tightly can further help injury prevention by stabilizing your joints.
  • Strengthen muscles — Strengthening your muscles, tendons, and ligaments helps them withstand the rigors necessary for in sports and other activities. In your customized injury prevention program with our experienced Union, MO physical therapists, we’ll work to build up your body to be able to stay healthy in the activities you love.
  • Improve flexibility — Stretching achieves three important things for injury prevention:
    1. It improves your range of motion, which allows for the tendons and ligaments connecting your muscles to your bones to adapt to more extreme positions.
    2. It enhances circulation, which allows for nourishing blood to flow to your muscles, removing waste byproduct and encouraging the muscles to restore themselves.
    3. It enhances your posture, which we already know is an an important part of injury prevention.

    According to research, sports like soccer that include bouncing and jumping require soft tissue flexible enough to perform those movements. Stretching and warm up exercises before activities further helps prevent injuries.

  • Use accepted technique — In every physical activity, 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 with the shoulder in order to reduce the risk of a head injury, and swimmers learn the proper strokes to use the appropriate muscles. We use DorsaVi video motion analysis to slow down your movement and evaluate how to both be a better athlete and reduce your risk of injury.
  • Don’t ignore what your body is telling you — If you feel pain in a muscle or joint, that’s your body’s way of telling you something isn’t right. If you feel sudden pain, stop immediately and seek proportional medical care. If your body isn’t feeling up to a particularly rigorous training session, don’t force it.
  • Don’t play through an injury — Even though gritting through pain is often viewed as a heroic act among competitors, forcing your body to perform with soft tissue or structural damage could make that injury worse and put you out of commission for much longer than you would have been sitting out. Depending on the severity of your injury, you may use methods like the R.I.C.E. method, seeing 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 — Most sports have special rules at different levels to help prevent injury. Penalties for leading with the helmet in football, rules against head-first sliding in baseball, and even the presence of special lanes on the street and sidewalk for bikers are all rules that leagues enacted to keep players safe. There’s a reason those rules exist, and a reason that violations of those rules are punished.
  • Speak a professional physical therapist — It’s a good idea to see a doctor before a new season or starting up a new physical activity. While there, ask your doctor if injury prevention with a licensed physical therapist in Union, MO is something you should consider. All of our techniques have been demonstrated to help athletes remain healthy, and we’ll personalize your program to how old you are, your injury history, and how physically active you wish to be.

Injury Prevention Union, MO | Sports Therapy | Physical Therapy Near Union

Injury Prevention for The Elderly in Union, MO

Falls in senior citizens were responsible for over 3 million emergency room visits and over 34,000 fatalities. Studies show that physical activity can go a long way in preventing falls. Other conditions like arthritis that accumulate over time can be slowed down by 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, appropriate strength, stability, flexibility, and ideal posture are great agents in injury prevention.

Other services we offer in Union, MO include:

Union, MO Injury Prevention | Axes Physical Therapy

Being injured in one of your favorite activities can create a mental block that keeps us from experiencing the same elation. The experienced Union, 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 confident 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 do not want to lose. Make an appointment online or call the location nearest you to get started with one of our injury prevention specialists in Union, MO.

Services Offered

Services Offered
  • Physical Therapy
    • Pre/Post Surgical Rehabilitation
    • Acute Injury Management
    • Chronic Injury Management
  • Certified Hand Therapy
  • Advanced Work Rehabilitation
  • Functional Capacity Evaluations
  • Sports Physical Therapy
  • Pediatric Orthopedic Physical Therapy
  • Geriatric Physical Therapy
  • Vestibular Therapy
  • Instrument Assisted Soft Tissue Mobilization
  • Spine Specialty – Certified Manual Therapy
  • Free Injury Screenings
  • Kinesio Taping®
  • Blood Flow Restriction Therapy (BFR)

Our Team

Stephen Brunjes
OTR/L, CEAS
Danielle O’Rando
Front Office
Sharon Titter
Clinic Director, MPT

Locations

Begin Your Recovery Today

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