Increase Agility, Improving Balance, and Build Strength
One extremely effective and common rehabilitation technique is functional training. The word ‘functional’ means being able to carry out the physical movements and duties in your daily life. It focuses on regaining strength and proper form in your musculoskeletal system with the goal of returning your life back to normal and even gaining strength. There are various different forms depending on the type of injury you are recovering from.
Improving Activities of Daily Living
Functional training is meant to improve your day-to-day activities which can range from taking a shower, to walking your dog, to cleaning the dishes, to mowing the lawn, to doing your job, etc. While everyone has the same basic functions on a day-to-day basis, your physical therapist will cater your functional training to suit your needs. This customization of workouts is what takes functional training to the next level in terms of you getting back on your feet quite literally. This makes functional training inherently different for everyone.
At Action Home Therapy, your physical therapist will determine your path based on your age, weight, job occupation, level of activity,
and overall lifestyle with a thorough evaluation. Functional training can apply to a wide range of people such as an elderly person to a professional athlete.
Helping with Injury Prevention
On top of recovering from an injury, functional training helps with injury prevention in the future. It increases agility, improves balance, and builds strength which are all critical towards protecting you form injury. If you are coming back from a knee injury, a physical
therapist will have you do squats on an unbalanced platform to not only work the injured knee, but to help build up your balance so that the likelihood of injury in the future is reduced. You will be back to your job as a construction worker with the ability to squat lower without any pain and lift heavier weights. If you have a wrist injury, your physical therapist will likely have you pinching rice in a bucket to not only engage your injured wrist, but to improve the strength
of the small ligaments that will support your wrist in the future. You will be back to your job as a journalist and typing at your computer all day pain free, and potentially with the ability to type longer without any aches.
If you are experiencing pain, be sure to seek medical treatment for a diagnosis to receive functional training. It is an effective way to rehabilitate your injury, regardless of age, gender, weight, athletic ability, or type of injury.