Research Shows Chiropractic Adjustments Effective at Preventing Sports Injuries

We see a good deal of sports injuries in our Gadsden clinic, and Gadsden Family Chiropractic is generally able to help these athletes. Stanford Childrens Hospital reports that over 3.5 million children of the ages 14 and below are hurt each year while playing sports. Add that to the almost 2 million adults injured each year while taking part in sports-related activities, as reported by statistics collected by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, and you can begin to see the necessity of preventing these types of common injuries. One way to possible achieve that goal, as stated in a study released in BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, is to engage in regular chiropractic treatments.

In Australian Rules football, hamstring and other leg traumas are common, frequently sidelining the players and affecting their team's likelihood of winning. One specific study was administered using 59 semi-elite Australian Rules footballers to see how well chiropractic adjustments could diminish these injuries and help keep them playing.

Research Proves Chiropractic Care Helps in Treating Sports Injuries

For this study particularly, every one of the players got medical treatment. In addition, half of them also received chiropractic treatments at the rate of one session each week for the first 6 weeks, biweekly treatments for the next three months, and one treatment each month for the last 3 months of the study. The other group were given no chiropractic intervention whatsoever and were used as the control group to assess the benefits of chiropractic.

Following 24 matches, scientists noticed a reduced number of lower limb muscle strains in the group that had been given chiropractic care. Furthermore, that very group also missed fewer matches correlated to non-contact knee injuries. This lead the researchers to conclude that chiropractic should be made an addition to sports training programs to effectively reduce the number of leg injuries.

Gadsden Family Chiropractic Can Help Patients Find Comfort From Sports Injuries & Help You Recover Faster

If you or your child plays sports and you would like to make sure more time is spent on the field versus on the sidelines, call our Gadsden office at (256) 543-3033 and schedule an appointment today. We will do our best to keep you in the game!

References

• Hoskins, W, & Pollard, H. (2010, April 8). The effect of a sports chiropractic manual therapy intervention on the prevention of back pain, hamstring and lower limb injuries in semi-elite Australian Rules footballers: a randomized controlled trial. BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, 11(64), doi:10.1186/1471-2474-11-64
• Misra, A. (2014, March 17). Common sports injuries: Incidence and average charges. Department of Health & Human Services.
• Stanford Children’s Hospital. (n.d.). Sports injury statistics.