Studies Show Chiropractic Care Effective at Preventing Sports Injuries

We see a good deal of sports injuries in our Lincoln clinic, and Dr. Jerrad Swanson DC, FMT, DN1 is generally able to help these athletes. Stanford Children’s Hospital reports that over 3.5 million children aged 14 and below are hurt each year when playing sports. Add that to the close to 2 million adults hurt every year while participating in sports-related activities, according to statistics compiled by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, and you can start to see the importance of preventing these sorts of widespread injuries. One way to possible realize that goal, as reported by a study released in BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, is to receive regular chiropractic treatments.

In Australian Rules football, hamstring and other leg injuries are commonplace, often sidelining the players and affecting their team's odds of winning. One specific study was conducted using 59 semi-elite Australian Rules footballers to see whether chiropractic could diminish these injuries and help keep them in the game.

Research Shows Chiropractic Helps in Treating Sports Injuries

For this study particularly, all of the players was given medical treatment. In addition, half of them also were given chiropractic treatments at the rate of 1 session per week for the first 6 weeks, biweekly treatments for the next three months, and one session per month for the final three months of the study. The remaining half were given no chiropractic intervention at all and were used as the control group to determine the benefits of chiropractic adjustments.

Following twenty-four matches, researchers noted a reduced amount of lower limb muscle strains in the group that had received chiropractic care. Additionally, that same group also missed fewer matches connected to non-contact knee injuries. This lead the researchers to conclude that chiropractic ought to be made an addition to sports training programs to effectively reduce the number of leg injuries.

Dr. Jerrad Swanson DC, FMT, DN1 Can Help Clients Find Comfort From Sports Injuries & Help You Recover Faster

If you or your child plays sports and you would like to ensure more time is spent on the field as opposed to on the sidelines, call our Lincoln office at (402) 484-5177 and make 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.