Recover Faster with Active Care and Physiotherapy

Recover Faster with Active Care and Physiotherapy

When it comes to chiropractic care, many only think of the adjustment. While that is a key component, there is much more to it. Chiropractors focus on whole-body wellness and often incorporate muscle and fascia work, along with movement, into your treatment.

What does that mean for you? It means getting better faster by using all the tools available to support your body.

Dr. Michele Vincent, chiropractor at the Bloomington Clinic, is an advocate for additional physiotherapy treatment techniques and what we call “active care” to help patients recover from injury faster.

What are Active Care and Physiotherapy?

Both active care and physiotherapy are techniques or therapies performed in addition to chiropractic adjustment.

• Physiotherapy is performed in the clinic before or after an adjustment, often involving soft tissue mobilization.
• Active care is done by the patient at home and includes exercises and other activities that help to improve their daily life.

The goal of adding active care and physiotherapy to chiropractic treatment is to decrease your healing time.

Who Can Benefit from Active Care and Physiotherapy?

Almost everyone can benefit from movement and soft tissue work. Whether you’re rehabbing an injury, battling chronic headaches or low back pain, or just trying to create better habits in the new year, active care and physiotherapy can make a difference!

Check Your Posture & Change Your Habits

Chiropractors tailor active care and physiotherapy to your individual case. However, there are some changes nearly everyone can benefit from, ideally stopping pain before it starts.  Repetition and overuse of muscles from poor posture can lead to pain. “It’s the habitual things we do all day every day for eight hours that get us into trouble,” explained Dr. Vincent. For example, sitting at a desk, driving a car, or looking down at our phones often puts undue strain on the neck and mid-back.

“One of the best things you can do is check and learn correct posture, even when driving,” said Dr. Vincent. “Leaning forward to get closer to the steering wheel becomes habitual. This causes neck muscles in the back of the head to overreach, and you can get symptoms that cause tension headaches.”

In addition to noticing and adjusting your posture throughout the day, Dr. Vincent suggests taking breaks to walk around and stretch, releasing the tension and muscles that you’ve been using.

Feel Better Faster with Chiropractic Adjustments + Physiotherapy

If you’re experiencing tension headaches, low back pain, or an injury, it may be time to see a chiropractor. Dr. Vincent uses physiotherapy techniques on most patients to help them feel better, faster.

“It’s all about soft tissue mobilization,” Dr. Vincent said. “Take a muscle group, and over that muscle is fascia, where you can find the adhesions or trigger points. We use specialized tools to break up the restricted muscle fascia to increase motion, rid the body of damaged tissue, and allow the body to rebuild muscle.”

One option she utilizes often is the Graston technique. Other common physiotherapy includes therapeutic ultrasound or electrical muscle stimulation.

Take Control of Your Healing with Active Care

Chiropractors want you to take the lead in your own healing, and treatment doesn’t stop when you leave the office.

“Active care is the ability for the patient to understand what else they need to do at home to add in with their adjustment,” Dr. Vincent said. “We’re there to teach them in the clinic. We show them and watch so they’re doing it correctly. We want to get the patient to where they can perform their goals at home.”

Completing exercise and range of motion therapies at home gives you an extra sense of responsibility—and confidence. It’s key to helping you feel like you have an essential role in your own healing.

Partnering with Tonal to Get Ahead of the Game

In partnership with Tonal, maker of the leading digital home gym, the Bloomington Clinic is now offering an exciting new program to take Active Care to the next level using virtual guidance and digital resistance.

“Tonal’s concept, which was introduced to NWHSU by UnitedHealthcare (UHC), is to offer their digital resistance training equipment at clinics so patients can come in and be guided through a personalized mobility and strength training regimen prescribed by their provider,” Dr. Vincent said. “UHC wants to promote increased value through innovative technologies like Tonal that contribute to better outcomes for patients while reducing overall cost.”

The 6-week program at NWHSU’s Bloomington Clinic allows a patient to utilize one of two on-site Tonal machines twice a week. Exercise protocols are designed to last approximately 20 minutes and typically target shoulder, knee, or low back pain. During each exercise session, Tonal guides the patient through the prescribed protocol while providing instantaneous feedback about their power performance and movement form. Patients are able to objectively see how they are progressing throughout the program to their ultimate goal.

“The Tonal equipment starts a patient off by first assessing their current abilities through a guided workout involving just four movements,” Dr. Vincent said. “It calculates appropriate starting weights and adapts to the growth of the patient as they improve. Both patients and providers benefit from the Active Care delivered through Tonal’s engaging experience and objective analytics.”

Seeing the Results

The goal of adding physiotherapy and active care to treatment is to help patients feel better faster and stay better. Dr. Vincent continues to use these treatments because she sees how they work.

One patient was working to regain strength and range of motion after multiple surgeries. The patient started seeing Dr. Vincent once a week for adjustments, then added the Tonal program. The patient felt great improvements and reported being “ahead of the game” when she moved on to other post-surgery therapies.

If you’re ready to see results and become an active participant in your own healing, call 952-885-5444 to make an appointment today!