Often the goal of physical therapy is to regain the quality of life you had before the injury. With functional rehabilitation, however, the goal is to come back stronger than before. As a part of normal physical therapy techniques, functional rehabilitation may help you to regain your fitness level. Functional rehabilitation can be broken down into three stages.
Stage 1: Simple activities
The first step in functional rehabilitation is to get the athlete back to do doing simple movements such as walking or jogging. Most of the exercise regimens will be like standard physical therapy programs. The first goal is to rebuild strength and range of motion in the muscle or joint.
Stage 2: Complex activities
More complex and sport-specific exercises will then be used in treatment. Lateral movements and agility training become key goals after walking and jogging. Also, the functional rehabilitation program will begin to introduce proprioceptive training.
This kind of training is to make the athlete more aware of the perception of their body. Squatting down and leaning forward to hold yourself up by your hands helps you perceive the weight of your body in a way that you may not have felt before.
Being aware of how your body moves and interacts with itself can reduce your injury risk by learning what may have caused the initial injury.
Step 3: Returning to the game
Athletes have that competitive drive that motivates them to get back in action as soon as possible. However, returning too soon can elevate the risk of a new injury or reinjury of the original area.
Functional rehabilitation uses goal assessments to decide when an athlete is ready to get back to their normal activities.
SOL Physical Therapy and Performance Training offers functional rehabilitation
While functional rehabilitation is mostly used for athletes, anyone can use the program to operate at their best. If you think functional rehabilitation might help you, then contact SOL Physical Therapy and Performance Training today.
