One thing you may be worried about if you play sports in your older age is how to prevent sports injuries. You may be especially worried if you haven’t played sports in several years and are just now getting back into it for your health and exercise. While there is no fool-proof way to prevent an injury, there are some proven techniques shown to reduce your risk of injury while you play. One of those techniques is physical therapy.

Our Rehab Access team offers physical therapy services to the residents of Belle Chasse and Gretna, Louisiana, as well as the surrounding areas. We work with each patient to determine your goals for physical therapy, and then we create a customized plan to help you reach it. If your goal is to play sports and reduce your risk of injury, all while increasing your strength and endurance, then our physical therapy services can help you.

Three tips for how to reduce the risk of sports injuries as you age

Knowing how to prevent sports injuries is vital for athletes of all ages. There are three tips that may help you prevent sports injuries no matter what level you’re playing at.

Tip #1 — increase your flexibility. Joint, muscle, tendon and ligament flexibility is critical to your ability to play sports. It’s these structures that allow you to perform the movements required to play a sport in the first place after all. Our team can help you find warm up exercises and stretches that may improve your overall flexibility and may also keep you from injuring yourself.

Tip #2 — take breaks while you’re playing. Many injuries result from the simple fact that your body is tired. After all, sports take a lot of energy and put lots of stress on your body. Over time, this stress can increase your risk of injuring yourself if you don’t make time to rest your body. This is why we recommend that you give your body short breaks during the game. We also recommend that you give your body plenty of rest time between games, too.

Tip #3 — do not play through pain. You may not know it, but some injuries develop from the repetitive motions you make while playing your sport. Repetitive motion injuries often begin causing you pain long before they become serious. However, it’s important you pay attention to this pain and seek help as soon as it appears. If you don’t, your minor injury may develop into an issue that may keep you sidelined for weeks or even months.

In addition to these three tips, our Rehab Access team also offers physical therapy services that may help you prevent sports injuries or heal after you’ve been injured.

Contact our team today for more information or to schedule an initial consultation.