OLD INJURIES
How We Manage OLD INJURIES
The economic burden of chronic non-traumatic musculoskeletal pain like non-specific low back pain, rotator cuff related non-specific shoulder pain, various Tendinopathies, patellofemoral pain syndrome are known to be costing the health system billions of dollars in unnecessary surgeries and loss of productivity.
At the forefront of this battle are Musculoskeletal Physiotherapists who have a unique skill set in clinical assessment and clinical management of these chronic non-traumatic conditions. These non-traumatic pain conditions can occur in all ages and all fitness levels and absolute resting of the area does not help as some patients would attest to before finally seeking help.
Treatment of these persistent injury diagnoses is only possible by understanding the specific story of the person which may reveal a known mechanical pattern where load on the tissues is altered, or the movement pattern of the person is maladaptively altered due to protective pain and fear of movement.
Treatment may begin with a limited use of gentle hands-on techniques if the injury is in the tissue healing phase dominated by inflammation, or dry needling to reduce local muscle guarding against movement, however specific exercise prescription to achieve graded exposure is the mainstay of rehabilitation in conjunction with patient education. As the tissue injury matures and pain symptoms are well controlled, exercise is progressed to match the capacity of the tissues.
Sometimes, we will train you in cognitive skills such as Mindfulness depending on your specific need and to ensure a high standard of objectivity, we use EEG neurofeedback for this purpose.
You can be assured that your musculoskeletal physio is an expert in exercise prescription even when you are experiencing ongoing pain and will guide you and inform you at each step of this journey.