We caught up with Ben Seagraves, a physical therapist at Children's Health Andrews Institute in Plano, Texas, to learn about the latest techniques for helping young athletes return to sports and recover from injuries.
Ease in slowlyChildren's Health Andrews Institute incorporates a full sports medicine team, Seagraves explains, composed of not just doctors but performance coaches and athletic trainers. "If a coach sees a movement fault or an athlete that may be compensating in some way, they will send them to us, and we can give them some corrective exercises or work on range of motion and stability to better their performance. This will typically decrease their risk of injury, as well," he adds.
"Many people think that a single muscle moves a joint, but the body works together," Seagraves says. "We may see in rehab an athlete who has pain in one area of the body, but it may be a result of a muscle imbalance or tightness in a different part of the body. We always want to look at the athlete as a whole, and by doing that, we're able to address not just the pain and the injury but other areas of dysfunction that may be limiting their performance or ability to get back to play."
Therapy 1: CuppingOlympic swimmer Michael Phelps brought cupping into the popular imagination back in 2012, and it's a modality that yields positive results for young athletes.
"We use a pneumatic pump with a plastic cup that we'll apply to an area of the body that may be tight," Seagraves explains. "We're pulling the layers of the skin apart and actually decompressing that tissue, which allows the muscle to glide smoothly underneath that connective tissue. We get an increase in blood flow to the area, and we get a reduction in guarding, which, in turn, reduces pain. That gives us a window to work with that athlete through some proper movement patterns."
Seagraves continues, "One great thing about cupping is, we see immediate results. We can put the cups on an athlete's shoulder, for example, take the cups off, and we'll see an immediate 10- to 15-degree improvement in the athlete's range of motion. That's huge!"
What about those ring-shaped bruises? "They look kinda scary, but no, they don't hurt at all," Seagraves states. They will fade in two or three days, and a lot of athletes actually show them off with pride, he adds.
Therapy 2: Dry NeedlingThe needles used in this technique look very much like acupuncture needles, but dry needling has only been part of sports medicine for a decade or two. "We're sticking needles in muscles, tendons, near nerves," Seagraves explains. "The idea behind that is, we're trying to increase blood flow with muscles that are tight or maybe have a trigger point. We're creating a twitch response that will get the muscle to relax out."
Dry needling is often performed at the beginning of a therapy session, and may be accompanied by electrical stimulation, which creates a tapping sensation and helps muscles loosen up for exercise. Seagraves describes the process as reducing pain and allowing for better movement during training.
Therapy 3: Blood-flow restrictionBodybuilders are familiar with blood flow restriction, or BFR, but it's relatively new in physical therapy. "You can think of it as a blood pressure cuff that we'll put on an extremity, whether the shoulder or the leg, and we'll pump it up," Seagraves says. A built-in Doppler sensor determines when blood flow is 100 percent occluded, or blocked, and then the therapist will dial that back to between 50 percent and 80 percent.
How does this help? "By decreasing blood flow to the extremity, the muscles aren't getting the oxygen that they need. From a physiological standpoint, the body's going to respond by releasing human growth hormones, and these help with building muscle growth and strength," Seagraves explains.
This modality is especially helpful for athletes who are recovering from injury or surgery whose muscles can't handle a full resistance load. "By utilizing BFR, we can go at a very low resistance level that's safe for the injured body part, but we're still able to build strength," he says.
Talk to a professionalTechniques like cupping, dry needling and BFR must be managed by experts, Seagraves points out. "It's hugely important to have a trained professional that understands the healing process and when these modalities are necessary," he says. "Whether athletes are going back to competition, going back to school or even if they're doing remote learning, we're here as a team to help athletes as they're training, so when sports do come back, they'll be ready."
To learn more about Children's Health Andrews Institute, please visit
childrens.com/andrews.
