Therapeutic Exercise
Start Moving Without Pain — Try Therapeutic Exercise With a Physical Therapist
Have you been searching endlessly for a way to improve your physical activity and relieve your pain symptoms? Therapeutic exercise is a great way to restore function and live a pain-free life!
Therapeutic exercise is a safe and easy way for people of all ages to find pain relief, and Total Body Physical Therapy physical therapists are proud to offer it in our Sarasota clinic. Many people assume that anyone participating in physical therapy treatments is recovering from recent surgery.
However, that is not always the case. Physical therapy provides a multitude of benefits for anyone wishing to restore their strength, endurance, flexibility, or stability.
In fact, physical therapy and therapeutic exercise can be used as a treatment for any pain, injury, or ailment someone may be facing.
For more information on how therapeutic exercise may benefit you, contact Total Body Physical Therapy today!
How can a physical therapist help me feel better?
When you’re in pain, your immediate reaction may be to lie down or get in bed. You’re not the only one who believes this is the best option for pain relief!
It is a common misconception that one should constantly rest when they are in pain. However, this can actually cause your muscles to weaken or atrophy during the healing process, which can lead to decreased functionality and more pain in the long run.
The good news is that physical therapy in our Sarasota clinic can help you. Our physical therapists are movement experts, trained in improving strength, range of motion, and overall function of the body.
Our physical therapists will design an individualized treatment plan for you that is equipped with the therapeutic exercises you need to alleviate your pain, strengthen the weak areas of your body, promote the healing process, and restore optimum levels of function.
At Total Body Physical Therapy, our goal is to help you live a pain-free life with even greater strength and endurance than you had before.
Benefits of therapeutic exercise
Exercise programs are aimed at improving health, so you can feel better than you did beforehand.
Therapeutic exercise is similar to exercise programs, however, it also includes targeted activities that are aimed at relieving pain and restoring you to your optimum level of physical function.
Therapeutic exercise can also be used as a way to prevent additional impairment or disability when facing certain physical risks.
There is a wide variety of therapeutic exercises and each one has a unique purpose. These include:
Relaxation Exercises
Even though lying down when you’re in pain is not always the best mode of treatment for pain, relaxation does play a role.
While it is important to work the muscles, joints, and soft tissues in the body, it is also important to help them relax and loosen.
Pain relieving techniques including heat, cold, electrical stimulation, massage, or trigger point therapy, can all help the body relax, improve your sleep, lower your blood pressure, and keep you coming back for more exercise!
Balance & Coordination Exercises
Your ability to care for yourself or your loved ones depends on your ability to balance and coordinate your arms, legs, hands, and feet. That is why balance and coordination exercises are so important, especially after an injury or illness.
Every time you stand or sit, bones and muscles work in conjunction with one another to help you remain upright.
Every time you stand, walk, sit, brush your teeth, cook a meal, or take care of your daily activities, you are testing your coordination between the muscular and skeletal systems in your body.
If you cannot keep your balance or lose your coordination, you lose the ability to care for yourself and you put yourself at risk for falls and injuries.
Range of Motion Exercises
These kinds of exercises are aimed at increasing the range of motion in your joints and soft tissues.
This may be done through active, passive, or assisted stretching activities designed to help your joints move better, without pain.
Area-Specific Exercises
It’s easy to think of exercise as something we do with our muscles, but exercise can also help our body’s other systems.
Area-specific exercises target breathing and circulation to help speed healing, improve blood flow, and lower stress on the body.
Muscle Performance Exercises
Resistance and endurance exercises are designed to increase muscle strength without injury.
Increasing power, endurance, and muscle strength are vital to good balance and stability, as well as bone and joint health.
Posture Exercises
Posture exercises are aimed at correcting poor posture, not just when you exercise, but also in your daily life activities to alleviate aches and pains.
Hours spent at desks, bending over keyboards, poor muscle tone, or simply poor posture habits can all lead to pain or injury.
What you may not realize is that posture has a direct impact on muscle strength, balance, and risk of injury.
Trunk Stabilization Exercises
Trunk Stabilization Exercises , also referred to as core training, are aimed at recruiting deep abdominal muscles such as the transversus abdominus and obliques. These muscles have been found to help fire the small muscles of the spine which aid in stabilizing the spine during activities of daily living. Retraining these muscles is crucial after back injury and integral to optimize body function and proper mechanics during rehabilitation of many conditions and injuries.
Are you ready to start exercising?
If you want a life with less pain and greater strength and endurance, request an appointment at Total Body Physical Therapy today to learn more about therapeutic exercise and how it can help you reach your physical goals and allow you to live the life you want!
