How Physiotherapy Helps the Body Recover

PHYSIOTHERAPY IS WHAT YOUR BODY NEEDS TO PERFORM

By Brian Ward

Even if you’re young and strong, you’re still at risk of getting injured. One injury could be minor, which will only take some rest to recover fully, while others can be serious and may require extreme measures to heal.

Before you undergo any possible surgeries, you might want to try getting physiotherapy first.

What Is Physiotherapy?

Physiotherapy is a method of treatment that helps people with injuries or those suffering from illnesses heal. Clinics like Bentall Physiotherapy assess the severity of your condition, give you a physical exam, and then create a treatment plan for you. The various treatments used in physiotherapy may include one or a combination of the following:

• Movement and exercise
• Massage
• Acupuncture
• Ultrasound
• Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation (TENS)
• Heat, moist heat, and cold therapy
• Light therapy

6 Ways Physiotherapy Can Help Your Body Perform At Peak Levels

#1: Pain Management

When you feel pain in your body, your usual first reaction is to take painkillers. Let’s say you’ve been spending regular hours at the gym with your Muay Thai sessions. You’ve always been injury-free, and suddenly one wrong move can put you in so much pain. If taking over-the-counter medicines don't solve your problem, then you must be severely injured.

Manual physiotherapy can help you manage the pain. Massage can help relieve the strained muscles and body tissues. It can help restore the function of your joints and muscles, and soon you’ll be up and practicing a new Muay Thai technique in no time flat.

#2: Improve Mobility

Severe injuries and illnesses can limit the body’s motor skills. If you injured your tendons or you lose sensation in your legs, you might find it hard or even impossible to walk again. Sitting in a wheelchair for a long time is not something that anyone looks forward to, so if you want to try and avoid that, you can give physiotherapy a try.

Movements and exercises can help you improve your mobility. Some exercises focus on strengthening specific weak parts of your body, and there are also full-body exercises like swimming. The severity of your injury will determine which kind of exercises best suits you.

#3: Injury Recovery

Athletes are highly at risk of fractures and other sports-related injuries. But even if you’re not a pro athlete when you do sports, you can injure yourself, too. The worst thing about being passionate about sports is it’s heartbreaking when you can’t physically do it anymore. Physiotherapy can provide treatments that can help you get back to what you love doing.

#4: Avoid Surgery

Undergoing surgery is scary, which is why you do everything you can to try and avoid it as much as possible. If you injured yourself and your doctor tells you that it needs surgery to heal, you should ask whether you can try physiotherapy first.

If the physiotherapy treatments can eliminate the pain, strengthen the weak muscles, tissues, or joints, and bring back function to those parts, then you might be able to avoid surgery. If not, then physiotherapy can improve your chances of complete and faster recovery after your surgery.

#5: Improve Balance

If your legs are the problem areas, then you might find it hard to walk. You might not be able to balance yourself right and keep on falling. Falls can not only worsen your injuries, but it can also take a toll on your mental health for not being able to stand on your own two feet.

Exercises can help improve your balance and coordination so you can walk by yourself again. For severe cases, you may require devices to assist you. Physiotherapy will help you get used to using what you have to be able to get up and walk again.

#6: Manage Certain Health Conditions

Physiotherapy can help you manage certain illnesses such as:

• Stroke - A stroke can make you lose function in some parts of your body. Physiotherapy can help bring it back so you won’t have to rely on others to help you do basic stuff such as eating, bathing, or going to the toilet.
• Diabetes - Diabetes can also make you lose function on some parts of your body, specifically on your legs and feet. Physiotherapy exercises can help improve those problems. It will also help control blood sugar
• Lung Disease - Breathing exercises can help you recover if your lungs caused the problem. Physiotherapy can help you clear the fluid in your lungs if there are any, as well as strengthening and conditioning it.

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Final Thoughts

Having illnesses and getting injured isn’t something anybody would want to happen to themselves or their loved ones. But accidents can happen whether we like it or not, and if it happens to you, you’ll want to take measures to recover. If you’re not too keen about surgery, then physiotherapy may be the answer for you.