Injury Rehab and Injury Healing Time – Influences on Success

Posted on July 22, 2010 by Anne Asher • 0 Comments

Healing an injury? Here are 9 things that may help you in your effort to speed injury healing time.

How long have you been dealing with this particular problem? If you get early treatment for an injury, chances are better you’ll be able to avoid a long term issue. One caveat: Some doctors – yes, even the holistic ones – over treat or try to sell you on injury rehab treatments that are not targeted to what you’ve got going on. This may be because they’ve invested in education, equipment, marketing, etc in one or two treatments they now specialize in. So buyer beware! It’s why I encourage people to seek more than one opinion and to research their conditions.

The complexity of your problem. Do you have a back muscle strain, or are you dealing with fibromyalgia triggered by a car accident years ago?

The severity of your problem. Again, a muscle strain is generally easier and quicker to heal than a disc herniation or whiplash from a pretty bad car accident.

Treatment and Rehab for Injury Healing

What’s usual for what you’ve got going? Much research has been dedicated to figuring out the prognosis for many diseases and conditions. This is the domain of an industry known as epidemiology. You may be able to learn about injury healing time for your injury by checking outcomes (epidemiological) research.

Your current health status and risk factors. Do you have more than one health problem? Do you exercise nearly every day? How’s your diet? These things factor in to the success of injury healing and injury healing time.

Your intentions and those of the people you’re close with. Where’s the harm in making goals specific to injury healing? I don’t think this can hurt you. Here’s an example – “I’m going to stretch all my hip muscles at least 3 times each week.” Hip muscles play a big role in your back health and posture. NOTE: This was just an example. Your rehab goals should be specific to you and are best made with guidance from a licensed physical therapist, or highly skilled bodyworker.

Your motivation. Especially with musculoskeletal problems like back pain, neck pain, joint issues, when you participate in your own healing, you’re likely to get better results more quickly. So to speed injury healing time, put yourself into your rehab. Seek ideas about getting and staying motivated from the people your see. Personal trainers, physical therapists and others are trained in strategies to keep the motivation going.

Safety issues. Setting your home up to minimize obstacles can help you proceed with healing. For example, throw rugs can be a danger for people at risk for falls. Also some people have a fear of movement once they’ve been injured. I had that after I dislocated my shoulder. OUCH! For a long time after, I held it very close to my body for fear of it coming out again. The result was I developed a lot of fibrous tissue in the area, which in turn, caused a bunch of things to go wrong in my back. It was painful and limiting. I should have paid attention to the rehab treatment I was getting in the physical therapy clinic. Ah, well, chalk it up to (relative) youth! I am finally working that stuff out, and I feel MUCH better, thank you. Fear of movement is this sort of thing that benefits from a visit or more with a licensed physical therapist, or highly skilled body worker. They can guide you on how best to move safely.

Your network. Research shows over and over again that the roles you play in family, work and social life matter to your back health. Ditto with your attitude. So get positive and get a healthy body!