Reduce the Risk of Injury
While playing a round of golf or picking up around the house may seem harmless, these are just a couple of the many activities that can result in injury due to abnormal movement, stress on joints and strain on muscles.
Because physical therapists are experts in knowing how the body works, they are able to design personalized treatment plans to reduce the risk of injury whether in everyday activities or sports.
For example, women perform athletic tasks in a more upright position, putting added stress on parts of the knee such as the ACL, resulting in less controlled rotation of the joint. While men use their hamstring muscles more often, women rely more on their quadriceps, which puts the knee at constant risk. To combat these natural tendencies, your physical therapist may develop a treatment program to improve strength, flexibility, and coordination, as well as to counteract incorrect existing patterns of movement that may be damaging to joints.
Injury prevention tips and sample exercises to help reduce your risk of injury are brought to you by the American Physical Therapy Association:
Did you know?
Physical therapist-developed exercise programs can reduce athletes’ risk of injury by 41%*
*American Journal of Sports Medicine, August 2008