Sports Injuries

The more you understand your body and how it functions, the better equipped you'll be at taking care of yourself to achieve optimal health. Our team of chiropractic professionals empower patients to take charge of your own health and future, educating you about your condition to decrease your need for future care. We've included the Patient Education section on our website to provide you with valuable, practical wellness information which you can incorporate into your lifestyle to improve the quality of your life. We hope you will turn to these pages whenever you have a question about health related issues and urge you to contact our practice at any time to make an appointment with one of our chiropractors.

You may be asked to:

Bend your neck and mid and low back in all directions, to determine problems regarding spinal range of motion
Bend your knee to your chest while lying on your back. This is a test to see if there is to see if there is hip, low-back, or muscle problems
Lie down and raise one leg – This is referred to as the straight leg test in which the chiropractor gently pushes on your raised leg to check for sciatic nerve irritation on tight hamstrings.

Foot Orthotics Informative Video by Foot Levelers; https://vimeo.com/160381789

The Complete Guide to Home Modifications to Prevent Falls: https://www.bigrentz.com/how-to-guides/guide-home-modifications-prevent-seniors-falling

Selling a Home with Modifications for Older Adults: https://www.homecity.com/home-modifications-and-selling-your-home

Helping a Senior Regain Confidence After a Fall: https://www.fivestarseniorliving.com/blog/health-wellness/helping-a-senior-regain-confidence-after-a-fall

Though there is no such thing as a "safe" sport, highly competitive sports, such as football, weightlifting, gymnastics, and wrestling, pose particularly higher risks of injuries, especially among children.

According to experts, as much as 20 percent of all sports-related injuries involve the lower back or neck. Running and weightlifting, and other sports that involve repetitive impact, expose children to a high risk for lumbar (lower back) injuries. Contact sports, such as soccer and football, expose the cervical spine, or neck, to injury. More than one-third of all high school football players sustain some type of injury. Soccer participants are easy candidates for mild to severe head traumas, neck injuries, cervical spine damage, headache, neck pain, dizziness, irritability, and insomnia. Heading the ball, the act of using the head to re-direct the soccer ball, has been linked with cervical injuries in children and adults. The trampoline and gymnastics also present significant risks for spinal cord injuries from unexpected and brute falls or contact with hard surfaces.

Here's a look at some of the other common injuries by sport:

Bicycling - Poor posture can greatly increase your risks of a back injury during cycling. When riding a bike, your lower back is constantly flexing sideways and up and down. Upper back injuries can involve the flexing of the neck. And the bumps and jars incurred on the road during cycling can wreak havoc and possible compression injuries to your spine.
Golf - Common injuries incurred during the sport of golf usually involve muscle sprains and strains to the lower back.
Running/jogging - Running and jogging puts a great deal of stress on your back, since the constant pounding against a hard surface can jar, and possibly compress, structures such as vertebrae, joints, and discs.
Skiing - Skiing involves a great deal of twisting and turning motions, as well as jarring landings, all of which can cause muscle sprains and strains and in some cases, minor spinal fractures.
Swimming - Swimmers are known to incur lower back injuries. Motions such as the crawl or breaststroke can cause the lumbar region to be hyperextended. If the swimmer is not properly conditioned or warmed up, the hyperextension sometimes doesn't subside.
Tennis - "Tennis elbow" is a layman's term for pain on the lateral, or outside part of the elbow, on or near the bony protrusion. Tennis elbow is caused when the tendon from the elbow bone tears or is ruptured. It is no surprise that professional tennis players can become inflicted with this with all of the stress and strain they place on the joint during play. In addition, tennis players are in constant motion, and the repeated twisting and trunk rotations can cause injuries. Shoulder injuries and turned ankles and knees also are common. The act of serving the ball also has been shown to hyperextend the lower back, and possibly compress discs.
Weight lifting/body building - Body builders are at a significant risk for a host of serious back, shoulder, neck, and knee injuries. Resistance training has been known to cause muscle sprains and strains, ligament and tendon injuries, and in some cases, stress fractures (also called spondylolysis). Older people seem to be at higher risk since their bones and discs are more brittle.