Prehabilitation for Sports Related Injuries

How to Prevent Sports Injury Through Prehabilitation Services

It is known that exercising enhances both physical and mental health, but the real question is – when do its effects actually start making a change in your body? The answer is a quite relieving and studies have shown that as little as one carefully planned and dosed training session can significantly reduce the risk of a heart attack! That is, if you remain consistent and attend your workouts continuously.

Here at Evolve, we can give you the opportunity to prevent things like this from happening. Whether it’s a heart condition, or a common sports related injury like tears or muscle pulls, by conducting prehabilitation exercises you can lessen your chances of an injury. Better safe than sorry, believe me!

Why would you need prehab?

Unlike rehabilitation which represents physical therapy after a certain injury or operation, prehab consists of well-structured and supervised exercises that ameliorate the outcome of a surgery, or lower the risk of training accidents of players on the field. That kind of preparation can be beneficial to your recovery, whatever situation you’re in. Leave your excuses at home, because here at Evolve physical therapy in Brooklyn, we can give you a variety of choices for you to better the odds when it comes to your health.

The Benefits of Prehab Exercises

Physical therapy prior to intense exercise or any other medical procedure can be a crucial step in preventing injuries. I always say that in order for a professional athlete to endure the enormous stress they put on their body daily, they primarily need to be functional and have a healthy postural status. Same goes for everyone else, even if they aren’t in that kind of situation. Whether you need surgery, or you just want to participate for your overall well-being. I myself, along with my team of highly experienced physical therapists here at Evolve, can guide you through a wide range of exercises that will help you prevent accidents such as:

Prehab for Knee Injuries

Injuries of the knee joint are one of the most common among professional athletes, and in many cases very dangerous because they can easily end their career. However, they can happen to anyone, even if they don’t play a professional sport. At Evolve we like to do things strategically and that means approaching the issue from every possible angle, in order to prevent these knee injuries. Our primary goal is to strengthen the muscles surrounding the knee, meaning every one that produces knee flexion and extension - mainly quadriceps and biceps femoris muscle, along with other muscles that contribute to overall stability of the joint. The goal is that after you go through our treatment you will be able to easily perform every movement in the knee. We want to make sure that your full range of motion has been restored, and that it remains stable throughout every activity.

Prehabilitation for Cycling Injuries

Prehabilitation is a fantastic method for preventing injury while cycling. Cycling is a beautiful sport, and I personally love it very much. However, there is one thing we should all have in mind when we think of going cycling - it is a highly repetitive sport. In order for us to be able to keep pedaling on and on, we have to engage in this sort of activity well prepared. That means strengthening and conditioning muscles that stabilize joints and take all the impact of those high repetitions. Mainly we mean your hips, knees, and wrists. Not only do they need good support, but you must also be aware of all the other complications that can occur because of an uncomfortable, non-physiological position when sitting on a bike. Our team can conduct different training and physiotherapy sessions that will prevent pain in your cervical and thoracic spine, prevent injuries of ligaments surrounding lower extremity joints, and most importantly to help you be able to enjoy cycling as long as possible without feeling any discomforts!

Shoulder pain, Muscle Tears, Pulls and Other Sports Related Injuries

Shoulder injuries are one of the most common ones in sports that mainly require usage of the arms, such as basketball or baseball. Basketball players often have problems with shoulder pain when lifting arms above their head, and why wouldn’t they feel pain when this puts the shoulder joint in a very non-anatomic position? On the other hand, baseball players need to have strong enough posterior muscles of the shoulder joints, in order to avoid tearing of ligaments, glenoid labrum, and more. Besides these, all the other sports carry their risks, but let’s stick to most common cases.

If you feel pain, or if you suffered a muscle tear in the past, you shouldn’t let it happen to you again. There are ways we can help you ensure that you don’t. By performing functional movement patterns as an element of carefully planned and supervised physical therapy, you can achieve the proper posture, stability and overall functionality. Whether we talk about shoulder prehab exercises, or exercises that give you stability and strength in every other critical joint. Undergoing prehabilitation therapy like we offer here at Evolve might just be the missing element for you to have complete enjoyment when participating in sports activities.

What are the main goals of prehabilitation?

Sometimes the external forces that affect our body in various physical activities can be inevitable and dominant, and there is just nothing we can do to stop an injury from happening. This is very common with contact sports. However, I think that in many cases we alone are most responsible for our injuries. All too often we engage in activities while being inadequately prepared!

When I say inadequately, I mean we usually skip the warm up. In my opinion, this is a terrible decision. A moderate warm up will increase the blood flow through our muscles and make them more flexible, decreasing the risk of an injury. Simply put, a 10-minute

Investment of your time can save you weeks of taking painkillers!

Your muscles need to be well conditioned for every specific type of sport. If you jog every morning and then suddenly you decide you want to play football, you will have a major risk of hurting yourself. Every sport has its demands, and if you doubt your strength or overall stability that’s needed for it, undergoing prehab won’t bring you any harm.

Last but not least, you can always give your muscles a nice good stretch whenever you can. Whether you just finished working out, or right before you hit the pillow. Remember, everything you do to contribute to your overall well-being makes you maybe one step ahead of an unpleasant surprise. If you would like to learn more about our prehab services, feel free to give our team a call today.

What is the Rotator Cuff and What Does It Do?

 By Nick Mazzone, PT, DPT, CSCS

What is the rotator cuff?

The rotator cuff is the name given to the group of 4 muscles that originate from different positions on the shoulder blade and connect to the humerus (upper arm). These muscles all work together to ensure stability of the shoulder joint during movement (dynamic stability). When isolated, each of these muscles acts on the humerus and moves the shoulder joint in different directions. These muscles are named supraspinatus, infraspinatus, teres minor, and subscapularis.

Why do we need this dynamic stability?

As we move the arm, these rotator cuff muscles will contract together to help keep the humerus centered nicely inside the cup of the shoulder joint (think ball and socket). If there is an asymmetry in strength among these muscles, the positioning of the shoulder inside the socket may be altered while you move your arm. Over time, this can cause irritation of other tendons, ligaments, and bone in the shoulder region. Some of the common diagnoses associated with rotator cuff muscle weakness are shoulder impingement syndrome and non-traumatic rotator cuff tears.

What happens if the rotator cuff is torn?

The most commonly torn rotator cuff muscle is the supraspinatus. People with supraspinatus tears typically have trouble elevating the arm and may exhibit a compensatory shrugging of the shoulder in order to assist in raising the arm.

If a partial tear is present, the muscle and tendon have the ability to heal without surgical intervention. In order for proper healing to occur, we must provide an ideal environment for the muscle and tendon to recover. This would include intervention aimed at decompressing the region where the muscle attaches to the humerus, which would be achieved through range of motion exercise and strengthening of all 4 rotator cuff muscles to help produce more efficient movement of the shoulder (to put it briefly).

If a complete tear is present, there are two options that one may follow. The non-surgical route would include strengthening other muscles around the shoulder joint that will help to compensate and act as a substitute for the torn rotator cuff muscle. Fortunately, the shoulder joint was designed to be able to withstand this type of injury and with the right rehab protocol, may return to normal functioning. In cases where this method does not help, surgical intervention is typically indicated. After surgery, patients will be sent to a physical therapist in order to help them return to their prior level of functioning.

What does physical therapy typically consist of for rotator cuff injuries?

The plan of care will consist of manual stretching and soft tissue mobilization of tense muscles, specific strength and stability exercise to improve the function of the shoulder, range of motion exercises to help normalize joint movement, and movement re-education to ensure pain-free use of the arm.

Click here to find out more information about physical therapy for rotator cuff injuries

Check out this brief video for 3 exercises that will strengthen the rotator cuff muscles:

Nick Mazzone received his Doctorate in Physical Therapy from Stony Brook University. He has a strong background in strength and conditioning and aims to bridge the gap between strength training and physical therapy. Nick believes that a lifestyle centered around physical fitness and mental well-being are vital to one’s successes and happiness. For this reason, he educates his patients on pain science and helps empower them and motivate them to reach their goals every day. You can find him at Evolve Physical Therapy in Mill Basin, Brooklyn. To view some of his other content, visit drnickmazzonedpt.wordpress.com.

Resources

Photo depicting widespread shoulder pain (top photo) retrieved from https://www.myanthemhealth.com/blog/shoulder-paincould-it-be-my-rotator-cuff

Photo depicting different muscles of the rotator cuff retrieved from https://www.slideshare.net/prkhuman/shoulder-impingement-syndrome-24685952

Photo depicting a rotator cuff tear retrieved from https://www.vivehealth.com/blogs/resources/rotator-cuff-tear

Photo depicting the compensatory shoulder shrug during shoulder elevation retrieved from https://healtheappointments.com/chapter-16-the-musculoskeletal-system-essays/5/