Injury CentrePhysiotherapists see patients with injuries of many different kinds, each of which require different kinds of treatment. Crucially, physiotherapists are concious of the benefits of early treatment whatever the injury. Injuries happenInjuries are very common and we all suffer from them from time to time. How we treat our injuries is important, as it makes a difference to how we manage in the future. A poorly healed injury can restrict our ability to do things or cause us long term pain. The focus should therefore be on injury management. Acute injuryAn acute injury is recent, and tells you nothing about how severe or painful it is. In medical speak, pain is divided between acute and chronic conditions, with chronic being long term and acute being recent Types of injuryWhatever the injury you have, a cut, strain, sprain or fracture, many of the underlying inflammation and healing processes are the same. So it doesn’t matter much whether you’ve just been rear-shunted in your car, you’ve pulled your back lifting a box of books in the roofspace or twisted your ankle playing sport, understanding about inflammation, treatment and healing applies to all of them.
Advantages of early treatmentPeople often ask about how soon they should get treatment. With acute injuries, getting early diagnosis (if necessary) and treatment is very important. The recovery time and pain endured can be minimized, and any costs and time away from work and activities reduced. It is much easier to treat a new injury straight away and settle it down with the right approach, rather than wait until secondary problems or reinjury occur. Soft tissue injuriesMost commonly injured are the soft tissues (some of which can be quite hard!) but this relative softness distinguishes them from bone. Examples of soft tissues are muscle, ligaments, tendons, nerves, discs and other fibrous tissues. In significant injuries it is important to be sure there is no bony injury, but the soft tissues are always injured in any kind of trauma. In general, sprain refers to an injury of the ligaments round a joint and strains refers to damage to muscles or tendons. InflammationInflammation is the body’s response to injury, and leads to successful healing in the vast majority of cases. The end result of healing is scar. Severity of the injuryInjuries vary enormously in their size and severity and it is important to recognize the grade of injury so that appropriate help and treatment can be sought.
Soft tissue alone?It is not safe to assume that when someone has a soft tissue injury, they only have that. Different body systems may be injured in any damaging event and these possibilities should not be ignored. If there is a problem, medical care may be needed promptly. This list of potential injuries is in alphabetical order and should not be taken as an indication of relative importance.
A suitably trained person should be on hand to assess the individual’s state of health in order to rule out any serious injury before soft tissue management is instituted. To progress further now, we need to look at the process of inflammation. |