Sports Medicine

What is sports medicine?

Sports medicine helps people with orthopedic injuries recover and get back to their active lives. Orthopedic injuries affect the bones, tendons, ligaments, joints, muscles and cartilage. 

These injuries often happen during sports participation. Sports medicine covers the needs of pro athletes, casual athletes, and all physically active people.

What are the most common sports medicine injuries?

Injuries due to overtraining, wear-and-tear or sports accidents are common. Examples are:

Fractures

Fractures are broken bones. Common types include stress fractures, which happen as a result of repetitive movements, or acute fractures, which are one-time injuries. 

Ligament injuries 

Ligaments are the thin, fibrous cords that connect bones. Sudden pivots, jumps, and dashes can cause ligaments to stretch too much or tear. Ligament tears may not sound as bad as fractures, but they can be just as painful.

Tendon injuries

Tendon injuries affect the tendons at the ends of your muscles. Repetitive activity, for example, distance running, may cause small tears and inflammation in certain tendons, such as the Achilles tendons. A severely inflamed tendon is weaker and more likely to rip (rupture).

Cartilage injuries

Cartilage coats the bones and helps them move smoothly. It can break down due to a sudden injury or natural wear-and-tear. One common example is meniscal injuries in the knees. 

Joint dislocations and joint instability are other common sports injuries. Advanced Regional Center for Orthopedics & Podiatry offers expert care for every kind of sports injury. 

What are my sports medicine treatment options? 

As an active person, you just want to get back to your life. The team understands your goals and provides noninvasive and minimally invasive treatments to help you do that. 

Common sports medicine treatments include physical therapy, bracing, anti-inflammatory medication and a gradual return to activity. 

More severe sports injuries may need minimally invasive surgical treatment, for example, joint arthroscopy. It’s a local anesthesia procedure. Your surgeon examines and treats your joint at the same time. You return home to recover.

This approach causes less bleeding and tissue damage than more invasive surgery, allowing you to recover and return to sports faster.