Injured? You Need a Rehabilitation TEAM
As performance based Physical Therapists, we strive to be an active part of the rehabilitation TEAM, whether athletes are coming back from strains, movement limitations or weaknesses, or rehabbing after surgery for fractures, torn ligaments, etc. Working as a rehabilitation TEAM is a tried and true practice that gives the best results to athletes. In fact, the Titleist Performance Institute has made this a staple in the management of golfers, and it should be used across all sports.
Having your physical therapist, your coach, and your strength coach all speaking the same language, or, at minimum, similar languages, is crucial for your understanding and your health throughout the rehab process. There are many benefits to having each of these individuals on your rehabilitation team, especially when they build off of each other, and have the same goals in mind:
Your HEALTH and Your PERFORMANCE.
Each has their own unique role, but they must also work together for the best outcome for YOU.
Unique Roles of the Team Members
Doctors of Physical Therapy are highly eduated to assist with evaluation and assisting with differential diagnosis of your condition. At times, the diagnosis is important in determining the appropriate response to critical questions: What specific exercises should you do to assist with recovery? Do you need further evaluation by a physician? Will you cause more harm if you continue to work through pain? Is working through pain OK? Can you play your sport? When can you return to your sport? How do you safely return to sport?
Performance based physical therapists have a further, necessary skill set - understanding movement, the needs of each sport and weight lifting, and the ability to take that knowledge and apply it to your rehab rehab approach to ultimately optimize your health and performance when you return to your sport. This is why performance physical therapy sessions (when done right), skill sessions, and strength sessions will overlap, or at times even look the same.
Strength and Conditioning Coaches, specifically those in a school setting, see their primary role as training the student athlete and preparing the athletes for the demands of their sports both in-season and off-season. Training is performance based and focuses on mental and physical well being. The objective is to provide a safe and open environment for students to engage in appropriate training habits and be a part of a culture that challenges them to be better versions of themselves. (Thanks to Coach Matt June for this synopsis!)
Skills Coaches are the coaches of your activity or sport. It is important for them to be in the rehabilitation loop. Importantly, they can help you focus on what you still CAN do to be involved. If you cannot play in a game, what skills can you work on safely, do you need to limit pitches, minutes to safely load and return. Can we be creative to keep you fit for your sport?
Working as a TEAM for YOU
While each player in your rehabilitation team has a unique role, the work of each should overlap. For example: your physical therapist may start you squatting or hang cleaning again, but the strength coach will then take over and increase your load; and a baseball player may start throwing a ball in physical therapy under a limited throwing program, but then transfer over to their skills coach to get back on the mound.
A well trained Performance Physical Therapist should be communicating with each coach about what they see and provide recommendations for progression back to play to help with management of the injury, and the strength and skills coaches should be reporting back to the physical therapist any issues they are seeing on their end in order to inform the therapy approach.
At Suarez PT nothing is more important to us than the health and performance of our athletes. We love to include the entire team as part of the rehabilitation process to keep everyone moving forward. There is nothing more frustrating to athletes than when they feel “physical therapy is too passive or boring,” or when their doctors, physical therapists and coaches are all taking different approaches - “coach thinks I should play, but PT says I shouldn’t,” “when I work out they have me do it a different way,” “the doctor cleared me but I still hurt.”
If we ALL communicate and have BOTH health and performance in mind - our athletes will shine bright!
Athletes being ON the court/field sets teams up for success. Poor management of rehabilitation or disconnects in the team, often leads to on-and-off injuries that cost individuals TIME OUT of their sport. Communication of health care providers and coaches is ESSENTIAL, and while at Suarez PT we think this should be the norm, we know it is not and we are making every effort possible to connect with the coaches in our community to keep our athletes on the field!
Keep an eye out for our thoughts on the role of Physical Therapy in the prehab, injury prevention and training process coming soon!