October is National Physical Therapy Month!
It’s National Physical Therapy Month. Do you know what PT is and how it helps you to move better?
It helps you to move from injury back to activity. When you have an injury, whether it started recently, has lasted longer than 6 months or is a result of a medical condition, physical therapy can be beneficial.
It’s a conservative form of treatment that allows you to feel, move, and function better. Physical therapists are trained to evaluate you and determine the cause of the problems or limitations happening in your body. They then create a plan to help you feel better and perform better with a lower risk of re-injury, whether that’s your normal daily activities or sport-related activities.
What you can expect in Physical Therapy
PT is movement-based therapy. Your physical therapist will perform hands-on assessments and treatments, as well as teaching you exercises to get you more in tune with your own body. This prescribed movement also helps to improve blood flow, joint health, reduce inflammation and pain, increase strength, coordination, endurance, and balance, just to name a few.
If you are in pain and contemplating injections or surgery (i.e. invasive treatment) and haven’t tried physical therapy first, you’re doing yourself a disservice. It’s true that sometimes invasive treatment is necessary, but often times people who are contemplating non-conservative treatment can improve their function and pain with physical therapy. The treatment can result in a quicker recovery post-op, reduce pain, and/or completely eliminate the need for surgery. Movement therapy can even eliminate the need for pain medication which only blocks pain signals and doesn’t fix the root of the problem. That is exactly what physical therapy aims to achieve.
A combination of conservative treatments can be beneficial to your recovery and allow you to become a better you, and physical therapy is a key component to living more optimally.
If you want to see how physical therapy might help you move better and experience less pain, schedule an evaluation by clicking here.