There is a current, albeit unproven, thought about the dangers of repetitive spinal flexion. Those who repeat this unfounded belief feel repetitive forward bending places the spine in a less than optimal position leading to back pain or injury. These thoughts have been disproven by the research and forward bending of the spine does not...
Ankle sprains are one of the most common sports injuries we encounter in our Boulder Physical Therapy practice. In our previous blogs we have written on the importance of early interventions such as manual therapy and proprioceptive exercise to help accelerate the recovery after these sprains. Prior research has shown a higher recurrence rate in athletes...
Running remains one of our country’s most popular forms of exercise. This is no more evident than here in Boulder where our citizens have been consistently voted one of the fittest cities in America. Runners of all ages can be seen exercising on our city’s paths, trails, and sidewalks. In our previous blog post we...
Many athletes enjoy a cold beer or drink after a long workout or on the weekend after a long work/training week. The acute, short term effects of these alcoholic drinks are well established, but new research is looking into the impact of alcohol on hydration levels, future athletic performance, and recovery. Alcohol effects all of...
The functional movement screen was designed to screen athletes and individuals on both upper and lower body movement tasks in order to identify those at risk for future injury. As participants move through the 7 movement tasks, Physical Therapists are able to identify areas of weakness, tightness, or decreased coordination. Based on these results exercises...
In the examination of healthy or injured runners it is tempting to focus on an individual’s leg alignment and posture. The hope of these tests and measures is it will help a clinician identify the source of client’s symptoms or a risk factor for injury. The limitation of these examination items is their inability to...
The knee is one of most commonly injured areas among our Boulder County student athletes. Injuries range from the traumatic (ligament tears) to overuse (tendonitis) across a variety of indoor and outdoor sports. Prior research has shown overuse injuries to be the most common knee injury affecting our student athletes but data regarding the risk...
Rock climbing is one of the most popular outdoor sports in Boulder, Colorado. Often these athletes present to our Physical Therapy clinic with both traumatic and overuse injuries. Most commonly, these overuse injuries involve the upper extremity and cause decreased performance and loss of climbing days each season. Each discipline of climbing including sport, bouldering,...
We have previously written about the functional movement screen (FMS) and its’ ability to predict injury although more recent research has called its’ predictive ability into question. The highest quality research on the FMS has occurred in NFL athletes or those training for the NFL combine. The research demonstrates the predictive value of these tests may...
When we began playing sports, our pre game routines consisted of a cardiovascular warm up, some agility work, followed by static stretching (sustained holds >15 seconds of the muscles). This type of stretching has fallen out of favor in the last decade because of the negative impact of static stretching on muscle performance. Research has...