Since the 1960s, the most common solutions to managing chronic pain have focused on medical consumerism, also known as patient empowerment. This politically charged consumer rights movement, while concerned with the right to be safe, informed, to make choices, and to be heard, also advocates for the right to more pain medication. Over the decades, this practice of self-managed care escalated into ineffective pain management, eventually leading to the 2016 opioid crisis. Since then, doctors have been exploring pain management options with their patients to combat the widespread misuse of drugs for pain management.

As the healthcare system began to reexamine its approach to pain management, healthier options became available. One successful strategy is reducing the level of analgesics to the lowest necessary level and implementing a physical therapy regimen. This combination allows the body’s natural healing to occur unimpeded by the unnecessary use of opioids. Through education, decreasing analgesics and increasing physical therapy gained notoriety.

What Physical Therapists Do

Physical therapists are licensed clinical professionals. They have completed an accredited physical therapist education program, earned a Doctor of Physical Therapy degree, and passed a national licensure examination. They coordinate with other professionals in the health care system, such as physicians, psychologists, and social workers. They are powerful warriors against the war on chronic pain. Their organized arsenal includes three steps. First, they determine the cause and impact of the pain. This includes determining risk factors such as disease history of diabetes and arthritis, cognitive and psychological factors, negative beliefs about one’s condition, and a sedentary lifestyle. Second, they define goals with the patient, and third, they establish an individualized treatment program. The resulting methods are different for each patient. Techniques may include therapeutic exercise, manual therapy, patient education, stress management, sleep management, and pain neuroscience education. The physical therapist develops and administers your plan. It’s personal. They make sure you are progressing and modify your plan as needed.

Chronic pain stemming from low back pain, before and after surgery, hip and knee osteoarthritis, and musculoskeletal conditions has shown significant improvement with management and prevention through restorative therapy, a purposeful examination of not only the symptoms of pain but also the movement patterns contributing to it. This multidisciplinary strategy promotes optimal physical function. It is a powerful tool to combat chronic pain while bypassing the unwanted effects of opioid usage.

Everett Physical Therapist

Physical therapy treatments focused on managing symptoms have had positive effects on fibromyalgia patients. Based on aerobic exercise, muscle strengthening and stretching positively impacted pain intensity, quality of life, stiffness, fatigue, and physical function. In addition, resistance exercises, aquatic exercises, massage, and therapy sessions with electrical currents have demonstrated a reduction in chronic pain associated with fibromyalgia.

Untreated, chronic pain can continue for months or years. Physical therapy provides an effective, non-invasive, non-opioid solution for lifelong pain management. Call our office in Everett to learn more about our physical therapy programs or contact us here.

Some of the more serious injuries in life come from more rigorous activities, like sports. Many athletes, even those weekend warriors, will experience multiple injuries throughout their sports careers. In fact, each and every year 3.5 million children ages 14 and younger are hurt while playing a sport or participating in physical activity. 

That number is shocking, but it doesn’t take into account those athletes at higher levels – high school, collegiate, or even professional sports. And while the number is high, the vast majority of these injuries are less serious – strains or sprains. 

It’s clear that sports injuries are not uncommon, but they can have very serious and long-lasting effects, even after the athlete has retired. While the best way to protect a body is to prevent an injury, there is the possibility of recurrent injuries and the need for helpful treatments.

Common Sports Injuries

Even though sprains and strains are the most common sports injuries that athletes experience no matter the level or type of sporting activity, there are far more common injuries to be aware of. 

The most vulnerable areas for injury are joints and tendons. These areas take a lot of the force when an athlete participates in their chosen sport. And these areas cannot be strengthened through traditional weight lifting or exercise methods. 

Many athletes will experience injuries to their knees, Achilles tendons, and rotator cuffs. Outside of those injuries, athletes often experience swollen muscles and localized pain, usually in the shin bone. In more extreme cases, though still common, athletes can break or dislocate bones.

While proper equipment and preparation are keys to minimizing injuries, there is no way to guarantee an athlete won’t get injured. The focus should really be on how to effectively treat those injuries that do occur. 

Treatments for Sports Injuries

Injuries happen and they have to be treated. How a sports injury is treated depends on the injury itself, as well as the athlete’s overall health and past injuries. Of course, each type of sports injury has a common treatment protocol.

Casting or Splinting

For broken or dislocated bones, athletes can expect extended immobilization in a cast, splint, or the like. This allows the bone and/or joint a safe space and enough time to mend itself. This is used for the smaller breaks and dislocations – wrists, feet, ankles, and collar bones.

Surgery

More serious breaks or dislocations may require different types of surgeries. These surgeries are used to aid in the healing of larger breaks like legs, arms, elbows, and tendons like ACL and MCL.

Localized pain treatment (injections/pain meds)

Many of these sports injuries, even swollen muscles and sprains, are painful. In order to treat the pain aspect of these injuries, many doctors will prescribe pain medications taken either orally or through injections.

Physical Therapy

Many injuries require an athlete to stop training even more for just a few weeks. Any time spent away from the field or training arena can lead to muscle atrophy, especially when a joint or tendon is injured. This usually requires the athlete to spend additional time in physical therapy to ensure the injury is healing and the areas around the injury can hold up when the athlete returns to the field of play.

Massage Therapy

Perhaps a less well-known treatment of sports injuries is massage therapy. Many may consider massage therapy to be a luxury, something to be used if time or finances allow. The truth is, massage therapy can be incredibly beneficial in treating certain sports injuries and helping to prevent future ones from occurring.

Massage therapy focuses on the soft tissues of the body – tendons, ligaments, muscles, and other connective tissues. These areas can be heavily fatigued as well as injured. The strain and impact these areas take can be extensive.

The use of massage therapy has been known to increase range of motion as well as power and overall performance, decrease overall muscle tension, and minimize the chance of reinjury. It’s a vital way to aid in and increase the healing of a current or past injury and protect the body in the future. So it’s important to see massage therapy as a key and vital part of sports injury treatment and prevention.

Everett Spine and Rehab: Massage Therapy and Physical Therapy for Sport-Related Injury

Come to Everett Spine & Rehab in Everett, Wa for your sports injury rehabilitation. Our clients love us–read our customer reviews here!

At Everett Spine & Rehab, we are more than a chiropractic office. We offer physical therapy to Snohomish County residents and we’re currently in the Top Ten for best physical therapy in Everett on Yelp. Our dedicated team of experts are here to help you recover, regain strength and achieve your health goals. We treat those who have: suffered a sports injury; gotten into a car accident; got hurt on-the-job (workplace injury); have acute or chronic pain. Before physical therapy treatment begins, we will conduct a through examination to ensure we get you on the correct path to recovery.

Common injuries that may require physical therapy include:

• Whiplash
• Stroke
• Arthritis
• Low back pain
• Shoulder pain
• Neck pain
• Tennis elbow (lateral epicondylitis)
• Sciatica
• Joint or muscle pain

It is often thought that physical therapy is something done after you’re in pain or suffered an injury. While that is most often the case, physical therapy can also be used to help prevent injury. If you’re seeking physical therapy to promote your health or as a preventative care, please see us. We take an assessment to see if physical therapy will be a right fit for your healthy regimen.