Sports Injuries
Whether you’re a professional athlete or a weekend warrior, sports injuries can happen to anyone as long as you are moving!
Your foot and ankle undergo many forces when you are moving and being active, however, sometimes those forces can just become too much.
When you develop pain or discomfort due to a sports injury – do not try to power through. Give yourself some rest, and call us for an appointment! We are pros at treating sports injuries and will get you back to doing the activities you want to do as soon as possible!
Types of Sports Injuries
Sports injuries tend to happen when your foot and ankle take on more stress or force than they can handle. This can lead to sprains, strains, tears, rips, fractures, and many other problems.
There are two ways that these injuries can generally happen:
Acute Injuries : a force hits hard and with sudden onset. This is associated with a traumatic event such as being tackled, falling from your bike, or twisting your ankle. Sprains, strains and fractures usually fall under this category.
Overuse Injuries: results from repetitive demand on your foot and ankle overtime, without providing time for rest. Repetitive impact activities, such as running or gymnastics are an example.
Additional overuse Injuries include but are not limited to:
- Achilles tendonitis
- Plantar fasciitis
- Bursitis
- Neuromas
- Stress Fractures
- Tendonitis
No matter what time of injury arises, pain is an indication to stop what you are doing and give us a call.
Treating Sports Injuries
As an athlete, or someone that just loves to be active, it can be really hard to stop doing the things you love when you are injured. Unfortunately, sometimes you have to take a break to allow your body to heal so that you can go back to the activity you love, sooner, rather than later. Not taking a break, to allow your body time to recover, can also increase your chances of re-injuring which will increase your chances of developing a chronic problem.
At Serenity Foot and Ankle Specialists, our goal is to get you back to the activities you love to do as quickly and safely as possible.
Everyone’s treatment plan will be different for their specific sports injury, based on the location and severity of their injury, and the individuals goals.
Parts of the treatment plan include but are not limited to:
- RICE (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevate)
- Stretches and exercises to rehabilitate the injured area
- Changes to foot gear
- Changes to activities
- Use of custom orthotics to help draw tension away from the injured area
- Surgical intervention if warranted
If surgery does become a treatment option, we will fully discuss everything you need to know and answer all questions you may have.
Prevent Sports Injuries
There are many steps you can take to reduce your risk of obtaining a sports injury.
- Wear appropriate shoe gear – Some shoes have built-in support and stability that are made for certain activities. Don’t wear worn-out or old shoes!
- Warm-up before activity – Make sure your body is ready to go through the paces you are about to put it through. Do dynamic stretches, which incorporates light movement. Dynamic stretches can be functional and mimic the activity you are about to perform.
- Rest your body – Your body needs to rest, in order to rebuild itself stronger after activity. If you don’t give your body the proper rest, you risk injuring yourself.
- Work Your Way Up Gradually – You want to work your way into a new activity or routine gradually so that you don’t risk injury. You want to increase the activity by about 10% at a time.
If you have a sports injury, questions about proper shoe gear, custom orthotics for your sports activity, or any questions about sports injury – call and make an appointment today!