Whether it’s a sports injury, a sprain or strain from a fall, or another injury from an accident, a Physiotherapist can help ensure you heal it properly.
“Someone will come in with something like an ankle sprain or a tendonitis or sometimes, sometimes more serious things like a rotator cuff tear, and some of the more serious injuries need surgeries, but a lot of them can just be rehabbed, so we teach them to safely start to load those tissues again. Even if there’s a partial tear in a rotator cuff, it doesn’t mean you can’t strengthen it again, but if you just have to be very careful in bringing them along in a certain way,” shared Colin Lewry, a Physiotherapist at Stapleford Health and Rehab in Weyburn.
He said if someone is a regular gym goer who is anxious to get back to the regular activity, he will work with them to modify their workouts.
“They don’t have to stop training, but take away those exercises or modify those exercises that might irritate it to allow them to still get some of the benefits from their training without setting themselves back and not allowing their injury to heal.”
Lewry noted that movement is important for keeping spirits high, especially after an injury.
“We see a lot of patients with chronic pain or chronic disability, so just dealing with that pain piece is very difficult mentally and emotionally. Sometimes physiotherapies turned into a little bit of therapy sessions because they have stress and sometimes the despair and depression from either being in pain all the time or not being able to do the things that they used to do, whether it’s it’s go back to work or back to the activities they enjoy, and they get depressed, and that’s a very real thing. The more depressed you come, the harder it becomes to stay active, but exercise has been shown in research to be a really good antidepressant.”
While physiotherapy is often recommended by referral from a doctor, self-referral is always an option for those who want to be in peak form.
Josh Lees, a Physiotherapist at Centered Physiotherapy in Weyburn, said there are trends at certain times of the year for injuries.
“Like when football pops up, hockey starts up, soccer starts up, or baseball or whatever it is, you definitely see trends and injuries increasing with that,” he shared. “Same thing when the seasons change, and you get a lot of shoveling snow, a lot of injuries occur from that, just from people not doing much, and then having to go shovel a foot of snow. Gardening is another one. Then definitely with the new year, you see some spike in that as well with people trying to get fit again.”
He said physiotherapy is a proactive tool for long-term health, and not just a reactive service for when things go wrong.
“We help with injury prevention as well as to help build at home. We’re not solely just there for rehab. We can do some things to help build that foundation so that it can be a resource,” he explained. “I do tend to see a lot of people, athletes or whoever, getting into some other intense activity and just say, ‘Hey, how can I be more efficient at this?’ Or ‘how can I not have an injury pop up?’ So we do a lot of just one-time consults as well.”
“Exercise is a large part of the rehab process, so trying to build people back up to functional levels. All of the exercises we gear towards functions that people do or are having problems with. So we’re trying to basically build up people’s tolerance to be able to do those things again and to be able to do them with having minimal or no pain.”
Lees said they will work with them at the clinic on the exercises, but they’ll teach them how to take their plan home for daily practice.
“Just trying to build up their education about the whole thing and then their independence with that, give them the tools to be able to manage themselves.”
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