Monday, May 26, 2014

Dealing with a Sports Injury

If you do any type of sport, at some juncture you will sustain an injury from it. What you do when you sustain your injury can make a big difference in the amount of time it takes to recover from it. Most injuries require rest and rehabilitiation, baring broken bones or torn ligaments / tendons. The absolute first thing you must do is get an ice pack on the injury. This helps to slow down any swelling that may take place right away. If necessary, get to a hospital at this time to get checked out. Taking painkillers is a bad idea at this time, because it can make it imposible to properly asses the damage.

Once you determine that your injury is painful but minor, you can continue to regularly ice it. A good way to go is 20 minute of ice followed with 20 minutes off. It is handy to have multiple icepacks at your disposal at this time. I personally like to use gel cold packs that can also be used as a hot packs. Once the first 24 hours ends, this will be very helpful. If you doctor doesn't prescribe painkillers, you can easily take over the counter medication to help with the discomfort.

After that first 24 hours, begin using a hot pack. The hot pack helps to promote blood flow to the injury which helps to heal you faster. You want to stick with 20 minutes on and off. 20 minutes of hot followed with 20 minutes off of hot. Then start again. You will have to make sure to stay off your feet and not stress the area. After a few days you will want to do some simple stretching exercises to begin getting things stretched out.

Massage therapy can also assist with sports injuries as well. A combo of soft and deep tissue massage can help muscles to heal faster and helps to reduce scar tissue. At this time you can now begin to do some basic therapy to slowly get back into shape. Using resistance bands can help with this if you were laid up for quite a while.

You need to slowly work yourself back into exercising and make sure not to rush your recovery or it will take longer. You should take it slowly and as your pain subsides, beging to increase your activity again.

No comments:

Post a Comment