Repetitive Strain Injuries
Repetitive strain injuries are becoming increasingly more common. This type of injury can occur any time someone engages in repetitive activities, such as carpal tunnel syndrome (link) as a result of typing or grasping all day for work, or rotator cuff injuries in overhead athletes. These injuries tend to be the kind that ‘came out of nowhere’ and can’t be attributed to any one incident. This is because these movements don’t tend to have enough force to cause acute injury, but occur too often to give the tissues time to recover completely. Eventually, the tissues can’t hold up to even these small movements any more, and begin to experience injury. It is similar to the old saying, the straw that broke the camel’s back.
These types on injuries respond well to chiropractic care, especially ART, acupuncture, or instrument assisted soft tissue mobilization. However, it is also important to mitigate the impact of the repetitive activities by including home exercises (link), supports to change the impact of these tasks on your body, or resting from the activity in question.
We are also big advocates of micro breaks to help prevent these injuries!
