Sports Acupuncture Treatment for Injury: Supporting recovery and return to sport

The persistent knee pain when running. The twisted ankle from a quick pivot. The sore shoulder from overhead bar work. The achy low back because you rode miles of technical trail... or wrecked your bike.

If you participate in sport, it's likely you've experienced some sort of ache, pain, sensation of tightness, or injury. Unless it's an activity-pausing injury, most of us will continue to push through. We simply love our sport so much, or we just don't want to stop moving.

For professional athletes, they don't have a choice, their body is their job. As a result, they're scheduling weekly therapies to address sore and tight muscles and injuries. And that weekly care works. One of the therapies many pros use is sports and orthopedic acupuncture.

Sports and orthopedic acupuncture therapy, including dry needling from a sports medicine acupuncturist, is incredible at addressing injuries, soreness, achy and tight muscles.

When an injury occurs, whether it is tightness, inflammation due to overuse or micro-injury, soreness or aches, the body is trying to protect the joint(s) and/or repair tissue. The specific scientific details of what the body is doing is outside the scope of this blog post. However, know that if you continue to push through without addressing the injury, it can make the symptoms you experience worse and increase susceptibility for further injury.

Acupuncture and dry needling, from a sports medicine acupuncturist, uniquely supports tissue repair and down-regulates the body's inflammatory response. Needles and electrical stimulation actually trigger the body's natural ability to heal, decreasing inflammation, and supporting tissue recovery.

In addition, a sports medicine and orthopedic acupuncturist may employ fire cupping or gua sha to help with fascial stickiness, fascial stretching techniques, and other Chinese medicine modalities to support the pain-free continuation of your sport.

I happen to hold an Advanced Certification in the Diagnosis, Assessment, and Treatment of Sports Injury and Pain. Because I am also a Certified Acupuncture Movement Specialist, I begin a sports medicine and orthopedic acupuncture treatment session with a movement assessment.

Injuries may be the result of dysfunctional movement patterns. Once an injury occurs, overcompensation may also lead to dysfunctional movement. I utilize special training to assess movement patterns and identify the tissue causing the issue, target personalized treatment, and provide mobility and motor control exercises to correct any dysfunctional movement present.

A common question asked is how often does someone need to come back for treatment? That is a difficult question to answer. Usually, I recommend for athletes to start with a treatment plan that consists of weekly visits for 4 weeks. After that time, we will re-evaluate the patient to determine whether a new treatment plan can be prescribed or weekly visits continue. The modalities I employee, including acupuncture, dry needling, electrical stimulation, body work, or gua sha, usually help to reduce symptoms rather quickly.

It's important to note that sports medicine and orthopedic acupuncture and dry needling may be preventative as well. From my experience, when my athletes come regularly they are usually able to keep their body moving and injuries at bay.

A quick note about dry needling

A future blog post will be dedicated to dry needling and the differences or similarities between dry needling and acupuncture. In the meantime, dry needling is itself an acupuncture technique, and pairing it with sports and orthopedic acupuncture addresses both local muscle tightness and the joint mechanics that let the injury happen. When performed by a sports medicine and orthopedic acupuncturist patients are able to resume activity the same day.

Thanks for reading this blog post! Leave a comment if you feel so inclined, and reach out if you have any questions. Visit my Services and Locations page to learn more, see what insurance carriers I'm in network with, and schedule an appointment.