Physiotherapy

What is Physiotherapy?

Physiotherapy or “physical therapy” is a regulated healthcare profession and the term physiotherapist and “physical therapist” are interchangeable. Physiotherapists are highly trained at assessment and treatment of the nerves, bones, joints, muscles, ligaments and tendons and the injuries, diseases and disabilities associated with these anatomical structures.  In a nutshell, physiotherapists can get you moving.  They are trained to help people restore, maintain and maximize their strength, movement and function.  Physiotherapists are also trained in specialized hands-on techniques to help alleviate pain and restore movement.

Physiotherapists have in-depth knowledge of anatomy and physiology and they understand how to apply these concepts in a clinical setting.  To learn more about physiotherapy, visit the Physiotherapy Alberta website.

Physiotherapy Treatments

Exercise is the treatment that physiotherapists are most known for and is what consistently produces the best outcomes in research. Therapeutic exercise is what physiotherapists are experts at prescribing and is a staple treatment. When appropriate, our physiotherapists use many different hands-on techniques and intramuscular stimulation (IMS) in addition to therapeutic exercise. These specialized techniques can produce amazing improvements in pain, mobility and function and can make it easier to perform therapeutic exercise.

How can physiotherapy help me?

We could go on for days about this. Here is a short list:

• Improve mobility
• Improve strength
• Help you breath easier
• Reduce pain
• Prevent injury
• Increase activity level

The list could go on. But the end goal of all of the above is to make it so you can get back to your everyday!

I have had physiotherapy before, and it didn’t work. Why should I see you guys?

We hear this a lot. First of all, physiotherapy has changed a lot in the past decade (or two). You may be surprised by what you see now. Secondly (and most importantly), physiotherapy is not the same everywhere you go. Although we wish that some things were consistent throughout the profession, diversity is a good thing! We highly recommend that you give physiotherapy another try. Just about every week we hear someone talk about how our clinic changed their perception (in a positive way) of physiotherapy.