Sports Injuries

While exercising is good for you, sports injuries are a common occurrence, including strains, sprains, dislocations
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Common Sports Injuries in Calgary

Some common sports injuries include Achilles tendonitis, hamstring strain, concussion, contusions, jumper’s knee, rotator cuff tendonitis, plantar fasciitis, groin pull, ACL tear, tennis elbow/golfers elbow, shin splints, skier’s thumb, separated shoulder and turf toe. With soft tissue injuries, including everything except bone fractures, damaged blood vessels cause bleeding, and injured cells release chemicals that start an inflammatory reaction. Inflammation is characterized by redness, swelling, pain, heat, and loss of function. Bleeding in the tissues is stopped by the formation of blood clots, and special cells called fibroblasts begin the healing process by laying down scar tissue. Inflammation is a response to injury and also the first step in the healing process. Still, too much inflammation is not good either, as it causes more pain and hampers function and promotes the formation of excessive scar tissue.

Treating Inflammation with ICE

Therefore, for most sports injuries, the pneumonic PRICE (protect, rest, ice, compression, elevation) describes the appropriate initial treatment for musculoskeletal injuries to reduce pain and swelling. Because one injury varies so much from another, treatment has to be customized for that particular injury in that particular patient.

Sports Injury Rehabilitation in Calgary

In general, most treatment protocols will begin with treatment in the acute stage, immediately after injury, to reduce inflammation and pain and increase the range of motion (or bracing or casting in cases where tissue damage has caused excessive motion or fractures). The rehabilitation stage aims to restore normal function and range of motion and rebuild strength lost following injury, and finally, a sports-specific phase where exercises are more relevant to return to play activities that restore balance and coordination and more specific strengthening and stretching. Treatments that may be recommended alone or in combination include:

Sports Injury Treatments in Calgary

Strengthening is used to rebuild muscle weakened by injury or increase the support of an injured joint. It is used to increase shoulder muscle strength following shoulder dislocation or strengthen back muscles following a disc herniation. Strengthening also helps to prevent future recurrences. At Alberta Back and Neck Rehab & Sports Injuries Clinic, we use the state-of-the-art Primus RS rehab machine, the Medx Medical Rehab machine, or the Multi-Cervical Unit (MCU) to test you in several different ways, including the range of motion, strength, power, and speed. With Primus RS, we can help you quickly recover from your injury by focusing on the measured deficits found on testing. Using the immediate feedback shown on the Primus RS computer screen, you can immediately see your progress from one moment to the next and from session to session. For athletes, Primus RS will help you increase your performance quicker while simultaneously measuring and tracking your progress.

For back injuries

We can measure your back strength on our MedX Medical Lumbar Rehab Machine and compare you to others of your same height and weight to see if you have lost strength or range of motion and rebuild appropriately. We can use our Multi-Cervical Unit (MCU) to do the same kind of measurements and rehab for neck injuries.

Myofascial release(Active Release Therapy)

It is designed to ‘release’ excessive scar tissue that may be binding adjacent tissues together, causing chronic pain following an injury.

Cold laser therapy

It is used to increase cell permeability to fluids to reduce inflammation. It acts as a catalyst to increase chemical reactions at a cellular level, thereby speeding up the healing process.
Shockwave therapy is a high-intensity sound wave that creates a specific type of microtrauma to chronically painful muscles, tendons, and ligaments that stimulate new arterioles’ growth, which provides the damaged tissue with an enriched blood supply and leads to regeneration and, therefore, relief of pain. It can also break down excessive scar tissue.

Joint mobilization/manipulation

Restores motion to joints that have become stiffened due to muscle spasm and scar tissue. This will speed the healing of the associated injured tissues in acute injuries and restore motion and relieve chronic injuries.

Stretching

It is used to elongate muscles tightened by injury or disuse and restore joint motion.

Electro stim

Electro stim can pump inflammation out of a muscle, reduce pain or initiate muscle movements following injuries.

Ultrasound

Used to try to help reduce swelling and pain and aid in healing. Massage can be beneficial in the acute stage to gently reduce the swelling from the damaged tissues and soothe the pain. Later, it can help reduce scar tissue formation and relieve muscle spasms that protected the injured area.

Taping

Used to support and protect joints, ligaments, muscles or tendons that have been overstretched.
Bracing is used to support and protect overstretched tissues as above but is generally used in more severe injuries than taping.
Foot orthotics are used to correct abnormal foot biomechanics that may be the root of many lower extremity injuries, often encountered in runners, such as shin splints, Achilles tendonitis, plantar fasciitis and patellar mal-alignment syndrome.

Severe injuries

fractures, dislocations and ruptures may require casting or surgery.

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