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Physical Therapy for Basketball Players

3 min readJan 26, 2024

Physical Therapy for Basketball

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There are not many sports, like basketball, arguably, one of the most demanding sports. Physical therapy for basketball players is mostly to keep you on the court. Like other sports, common injuries are both traumatic and nontraumatic. Due to the high volume of jumping, starting and stopping when running, and overall change in speed and direction, multi joint control is paramount. Wear and tear injuries are among the highest, due to the repetitive use of the knees and ankles. The myriad of different ways someone can be injured, physical therapy intervention has to require many different hats. Certain injuries are also more prevalent in adolescence, which bring a unique element that separates and requires sports specific training at the completion of recovery.

All sports have unique components, but none require the demand on the ankles and the knees quite like basketball. Many of the noncontact injuries, apart from the freak ACL tear, are from repetitive use disorders or overuse. The damage that can be done is different when you’re younger versus when you’re older. This happens around the time of growth spurts, and is intensity specific. Today’s landscape requires near year round play to keep up with the skill progression.

Sports like baseball have the luxury, with pitchers to have some guidelines, but with basketball it’s harder to grade what amount of work that you can do while in practice or a game, to prevent injury. Osgood-Schlatter’s and Sever’s disease are two classic examples of overuse injuries in adolescent basketball players. Although it can happen with other sports, it’s most prevalent in basketball largely due to the jumping. Both are talking about the stress that is put on a bone around a growth plate, one at your knee and one at your ankle. The mechanism for either of these is the same tendon which attaches to the bone around or at the site of a growth plate is being worked. The repetitive pulling on the bone where the growth plate is causes a bony growth, which in turn changes how the tendon works effectively by its length position, which cascades into further overloading of the tendon and the cycle continues.

Physical therapy intervention initially starts with understanding this load and understanding the activity, finding a way to decrease it to minimize the amount of continued progression, allowing the inflammatory cycle to calm down in the early stages, and eventually progress back towards normal activity. This style of treatment is not too dissimilar with other forms of repetitive use disorders, like carpal tunnel, tennis elbow, or golfer’s elbow. The big difference is that these are typical specifically with basketball because of the jumping in the landing. Although they can be present other sports, they’re far more common in basketball.

The last step in recovery is called sports specific training, and when taking into consideration the type of stress, it helps answer the biggest question, when someone can get back to playing safely. Having the ability to answer this allows for the refinement of a program given the myriad of variables that each athlete presents with. Sometimes this type of training introduces other healthcare professionals. Athletic trainers are highly specialized in their craft, and have a complementary overlap in the musculoskeletal management with Physical Therapists. Their overall use application will depend on the institutions or organizations, i.e. can they afford it. This division of responsibility, especially with more reputable programs, help maximize player safety, while minimizing being out of the game.

Click here to find out more information about physical therapy for baseball players

About EvolveNY-
Brooklyn’s Premier Holistic Physical Therapy Clinics- There’s physical therapy, there’s training, and then there’s EVOLVE. We use the science of biomechanics merged with fitness to help our patients get better and stay better!

First we evaluate, then we heal, then we strengthen our clients so they can reach their goals, feel better, and live happier lives. We do so by utilizing a range of core techniques and specialized treatments to reduce pain, improve mobility, enhance physical strength and deal with the underlying issues, not just the pain itself.

Multiple Brooklyn Physical Therapy Locations!
1–718–258–3300
https://EvolveNY.com

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EvolveNY
EvolveNY

Written by EvolveNY

There’s #physicaltherapy, there’s training, and then there’s EVOLVE. We use the science of #biomechanics merged with #fitness to help our #patients get better!

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