Rehab Back To Fab
When is an injury healed or (recovered)? Does lack of pain mean, one can stop seeing a physiotherapist?
When there is an injury, there is inflammation and the injured tissue, send a signal to the brain which in turn, causes tightening of muscles around the injury to provide protection to the injured structures.
Inflammation is basically the increased blood flow ( redness and warmth ) to the injured site with various chemicals ( including pain chemicals) to prevent movement and encourage healing to occur.
This makes perfect sense, you are injured and your body wants you to stop agitating the injured area to help it recover.
Together, inflammation and muscle tightness is what most patients complain as pain or discomfort that is stopping them from getting on with their daily activities.
However, one needs to note with caution that ceasing treatment once the pain is gone is not optimal. Neither is regular pain relief treatment with no attempts to rehabilitate the muscles, the patient and structure involved in the injury.
Once inflammation and tightness of the muscles are gone, all injured areas and the surrounding muscles that have been weakened during the inflammation stage need to be rehabilitated. These muscles require strengthening and rehabilitation to work with each other to regain balance and dynamic stability. Basically, the patient and the injured area need to be thought to perform everyday activities as before without re-injuring the area.
If the injury was caused by poor technique, then this needs to be addressed as well and all strengthening and rehabilitation needs to be done with the new and corrected techniques in place.
This is what sets apart ProPhysio clinicians who are passionate about addressing not only short term pain relief but rehabilitation that keeps the patients needs in mind to prevent long term disability and recurrent injury and participation in activities that they most enjoy with no discomfort or worsening of the injury.
This commitment results it learning skills that not only rehabilitates injured areas but further empowers the clients to face new challenges in sports, leisure and life with renewed confidence.
The key element is commitment from the client to attend regular Physiotherapy sessions in a timely manner, discuss and inculcate newly learned skills and participate actively in rehabilitation.
Ceasing Physiotherapy after pain is gone is big loss of an opportunity to regain function and achieve greater heights in performance in all aspects of life.
– Abi