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Ankle pain and injury can happen to anyone whether you’re an athlete or not, but 25 percent of sports injuries are foot and ankle related. These types of injuries are common for those participating in sports like basketball, soccer, football, dancing, and other running-and-jumping activities and include:
*Strains and sprains
*Achilles tendonitis/tears
*Plantar fasciitis
*Stress fractures
*Fractures
In soccer alone, ankle sprains and foot fractures are some of the most common injuries sidelining players at all levels.
While you can twist your ankle stepping off a curb or on other uneven surfaces, the speed, and force involved in athletic ankle injuries often make them much more severe, so it’s important that they are diagnosed properly and treated correctly.
When they aren’t, chronic pain and even disability can occur — and not just in the foot!
An ankle that does not heal and function properly can affect mobility and gait, requiring compensation from other parts of the body, leading to misalignments and discomfort in the knee, hip, and back as well. The resultant pain can affect not only your participation in your athletic pursuits but the way you walk and perform everyday tasks.
While it’s always a good idea to initially rest an injured ankle, painful foot, or other body parts, it’s also important to find out what’s wrong with it. Sports chiropractic uses a variety of diagnostic tools, including x-rays, MRIs, and CT scans to thoroughly assess the source of the pain and determine the cause. Once any swelling goes now, a chiropractor can manually evaluate the foot for injury-related misalignments that will prevent complete healing or might have led to the injury in the first place.
Sports chiropractic is great for helping to reduce pain and speed healing without prescription medications and the many side effects that often come with them. Instead, chiropractic uses a variety of proven techniques such as electrical muscle stimulation, cold laser therapy, Pulsed Electro Magnetic Field therapy (PEMF), Kinetisense Technology, and stretch therapy to initiate and boost the body’s natural healing processes.
These rehabilitation therapies complement manipulations that may be needed on the ankle to encourage greater stability, strength, mobility, and flexibility that not only will assist in complete healing but could help to prevent injuries in the future.
Sports chiropractic routinely identifies misalignments in the body that might have contributed to a weakened ankle structure, as well as other misalignments that resulted from a recurring ankle injury or chronic ankle pain. It’s amazing how often knee, hip, and back pain is related to the original ankle injury, or vice versa, and addressing one can lead to relief in all areas.
Treating sports injuries quickly and properly is the best way to get you back in the game, but a strong focus on injury prevention is key. Regular sports chiropractic is a non-invasive, extremely effective means of both treating and preventing ankle pain and injury. Specialized expertise in body mechanics, nutrition, and conditioning allows sports chiropractors at Dynamic Sports Medicine to help athletes keep athletes injury-free while optimizing performance through improved range of motion, flexibility, and strength.
