Staff Writer
With summer leagues in your community in full swing, Major League Baseball heating up, and National Football League teams beginning team activities, it’s a good time to remember there more than 8.6 million sports-related injuries every year, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. If an injury happens to you or a loved one, seeing a chiropractor makes sense.
What the Pros Know About Chiropractic Care
Did you know all 32 teams in NFL employ a chiropractor? So do most other professional sports teams, from basketball (NBA) to hockey (NHL), to professional soccer. Jordan Spieth, professional golfer and past winner of the Masters, U.S. Open, and Open Championship, has his chiropractor, Troy Van Biezen, D.C., travel with him on tour.
Chiropractic is also at the forefront of the Olympics. As of 2018, There are 83 chiropractors listed in the U.S. Olympic Committee’s National Medical Network, representing more than 36% of the healthcare providers listed.
Clearly, the facts bear it out. Confidence in chiropractic treatment for musculoskeletal-related sports injuries and as a method of maintaining performance levels is at an all-time high for high-performing athletes. They know what you should know: chiropractic and sports are good together. Ask yourself this question, “If chiropractic is good enough for them, isn’t it good enough for me?”
There are generally three categories of chiropractic care for sports injuries:
Acute care. Acute care – meaning treatment for brief but severe pain – usually results from a specific injury, and it’s known when the injury occurred.
Acute care treatment frequently includes icing the area and resting it, along with any chiropractic manual therapy, exercises, or other treatments deemed necessary by the doctor of chiropractic.
Ongoing care. Think of ongoing care as maintenance treatments on a semi-regular schedule to keep the body in proper alignment and ensure that joints don’t lock up. Ongoing care treatments include manual techniques, exercises, and other methods recommended by the chiropractor.
New care for old injuries. New care may be needed for an old injury that was never treated or treated improperly flares up years or decades later. A chiropractor will want a history of the injury, including how it happened, care received previously, and how much use the area receives.
After the history is complete and an examination performed, the chiropractor can develop a treatment plan. The short-term goal is to relieve the pain as quickly as possible. The long-term goal is to find and correct the root cause of the problem. Depending on the severity of the injury, treatment often follows the same patterns as acute and ongoing care: ice, rest, exercises, and manual therapies.
Know When to See a Chiropractor
Remember that aches and discomfort after a sports event or exercise should go away soon after the activity ends. Sudden or persistent pain is your body telling you that something’s wrong. Common injuries a doctor of chiropractic can treat include:
Your Chiropractor is Your Partner in Better Health
Chiropractors excel in conservative management of spinal and extremity conditions. If you’re into sports and other high-movement activities, your chiropractor can make a great teammate. They can help you to perform as you’d like and make sure you’re on track for good health over your lifetime.
Cleveland University-Kansas City (CUKC), founded in 1922, is a private, nonprofit, chiropractic and health science-focused university in Overland Park, Kansas. The CUKC on-campus Chiropractic Health Center is open to the public and treats patients from Kansas City’s 15-county metro area. Our goal is to provide care and solutions for a better, more productive life for our patients.
