Why Physical Therapy Is One of The Best Routes To Take When Recovering From An Injury

Why Physical Therapy Is One of The Best Routes To Take When Recovering From An Injury

Every year, about 37.9 million injury cases are received in the emergency room. Additionally, over 140,000 people die from injuries making it one of the major causes of premature deaths in the United States. Physical therapy is crucial to healing after an injury as it boosts your body’s natural healing process. Quality Physical therapy enables you to return to the activities you love soonest. 

At Advanced Care Specialists, we offer a customized physical therapy program suited for your type of injury, enabling you to return to your optimum level of functioning. We understand that recovering from a severe injury requires a lot of patience, so our highly experienced physical therapists patiently and compassionately treat your pain, correct what is causing it, and help you prevent future injuries. Our physical therapists use a combination of stretching and strengthening exercises, helping you regain your range of motion, mobility, and flexibility. Read on to learn what physical therapy can do for your body as you recover from an injury.

What Is Physical Therapy?

Physical therapy is the treatment given for injuries, diseases, or deformities rather than the use of drugs or surgery. Physiotherapy methods treat the injury, relieve pain, regain strength, and improve mobility.

There are various methods used in physical therapy, including massage therapy, heat treatment, exercises, and balance training. When you are injured, you may experience pain, swelling, and limited range of motion, which take time to heal. This is where physical therapy comes in. While recovering, physical therapy plays a part in a natural way of healing and returning to normalcy. 

It’s crucial to seek the services of a physical therapist who will set a recovery schedule for faster recovery and also inform you on what to do or avoid. You might also go through psychological distress; you may feel depressed and anxious about whether or not you will recover fully. You may also go through post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which can negatively affect your recovery.

 Physical therapy is vital to healing and preventing future injuries. It also helps bring your body back to function as it used to through proper rehabilitation. 

What To Expect

Your physical therapist will begin by explaining what to expect from your recovery journey and answer questions about your healing process. This helps ease your concerns, worries, and anxieties about your recovery while reassuring you that your goals are achievable. There are four phases of physical therapy, including:

  • The Recovery Stage: This involves decreasing pain and inflammation.
  • The Repair Stage: This stage focuses on increasing mobility, flexibility, balance, and strength. 
  • The Strength Stage: Your physical therapist will help maintain your strength and prevent injury.
  • The Function stage: You will return to normal function or activity at this stage. 

Types of Injuries 

Types of injuries may include:

  • Soft tissue injuries: These involve muscles, tendons, and ligament injuries.
  • Strain injuries: Strain injuries over-stretch muscles and tendons. The injury can be mild or severe.
  • Tear injuries: This happens when tendons, muscles and ligaments partially or entirely tear either suddenly or quickly.
  • Sprain injuries: Are caused by a sudden fall or twist. An example is a twisted ankle.

Places Where Injuries Occur

Injuries occur in the following areas:

  • Sports injuries may result in knee injury, dislocations, ankle sprains, concussions, shin splints, runner’s knee, rotator cuff injury, and tennis elbow or little league.
  • Work injuries commonly include falling, slipping, repetitive movements, tripping, fires, and explosions, or workplace equipment.
  • Home injuries include falls, trips, or slips.

Benefits of Physical Therapy

Relieves Pain

Chronic pain causes many discomforts and affects your quality of life, limiting your ability to move, work, or interact with your loved ones. It can also lead to lasting disability. You might experience pain that lasts for days or months. Physical therapy can help alleviate or eliminate pain. A physical therapist might recommend electrical stimulation, cupping, manual therapy, ultrasound, tapping, or joint and soft tissue stimulation. With physical therapy, you do not have to depend on harmful painkillers or be addicted to them.

Strength and Endurance

Physical therapy restores one’s strength and muscles’ stamina. When your muscles are strong, the injured joints are supported, which assists in your healing process. A physical therapist assists in training the weak, stiff muscles to become flexible and robust for recovery and movement restoration. This is achieved through passive and active strength exercises. As you continue with your strengthening exercises, you will regain your balance, gradually feel better daily, and improve your mental health and wellness.

Restore The Range of Motion

Due to the impact of your injury, moving might be difficult and painful at first. If you cannot stretch or stand, it’s time to visit a physical therapist. Within the first weeks after an injury, your physical therapist will assist in restoring your range of movement. They will gently push you through the discomfort. 

Physical therapists use specific exercises to rehabilitate your injured areas. They may use icing, compression, and rest to control inflammation and pain. They focus on your stiff muscles and connective tissues using gentle stretching exercises to mobilize them. For knee surgery, lower back rehabilitation, and shoulder surgery, mobility restoration may be achieved through weight lifting or short walks.

Speed Up Recovery from an Injury

Your recovery process may take time, and you might need to take some time off work. Some injuries may take time to heal, taking several weeks or months. Physical therapy can help reduce this time by half. 

Your physical therapist determines the best and fastest route to recovery. They may recommend ice therapy to relieve pain and swelling or massages to increase blood circulation throughout your body. Additionally, physical therapy can help increase endorphin levels in your brain, which blocks pain signals and reduce stress.

Prevent Future Injuries

A point of injury can be injured again; for example, sports involve repetitive injury or sudden stress motions. This can lead to re-injury. If you did not heal properly, you might have residual pain and limited range of motion. To avoid such risks, physical therapy comes in handy. 

A physical therapist is trained to help you build strength, flexibility, and coordination. Working with a physical therapist will help you avoid future injuries since they promote proper healing.

Physical Therapy Can Help Avoid Surgery

After an injury, a thorough evaluation is necessary. If you had a severe injury, surgery may be the only option. Surgery can be expensive, and it carries a lot of risks and a long recovery process. 

In certain cases, physical therapy should be tried first. It is a minimally invasive procedure and may prevent the need for surgery. If it is unavoidable, your physical therapists can perform pre-surgery physical therapy to help prepare you for surgery, resulting in a faster recovery. It also helps ease inflammation, and you may heal sooner than you thought.

If you have been injured or are considering physical therapy, contact Advanced Care Specialists today or schedule an appointment online. Our trained physical therapists are glad to help you fully recover.