Sports injury physiotherapy assesses the injured tissue and the movement that loaded it, treats the injury, and rebuilds your capacity to the demands of your sport. We treat recreational athletes, weekend players and people who simply want to get back to running.
Most recurring sports injuries are not bad luck. They come back because the athlete returned to full load before the tissue and the movement pattern were ready for it.
What we treat
Sprains, strains and ligament injuries. Tendon problems, including Achilles, patellar and rotator cuff. Runner’s knee, shin splints, plantar fasciitis and the overuse injuries that appear when training volume climbs faster than tissue adapts. Shoulder instability and impingement. Ankle sprains, including the ones that keep happening. Post-operative rehabilitation, including ACL reconstruction.
Why it keeps coming back
Part of every assessment is working out what caused it, not just what hurts.
Usually it is one of four things. Training load climbed too quickly. Technique put the tissue in a position it could not tolerate. An old injury was never properly rehabilitated and the body has been compensating around it ever since. Or there is a strength gap somewhere else in the chain, and the injured tissue has been absorbing work that belonged to a hip or a mid-back.
Treating the painful tissue without addressing the cause buys you a few comfortable weeks and then you are back.
Return to sport, by criteria rather than calendar
You progress when you meet the strength, control and load targets for the next stage, rather than because a set number of weeks has passed.
This is slower to promise and it is the part people push back on. A date feels reassuring. The problem is that tissue does not read calendars, and returning on a date rather than on capacity is the most reliable way to injure the same thing twice.
We will tell you where you actually are, including when that is further back than you hoped.
What to do in the first 48 hours
For an acute injury, protect it and keep it moving within comfort. Complete immobilisation beyond the first day or two generally slows things down rather than speeding them up.
Get it assessed if you could not weight-bear immediately after the injury, if there is significant swelling that came on within an hour, if the joint felt unstable or gave way, or if you heard or felt a pop. Those warrant a proper look before you start rehabilitating anything.
