What is…Sports Therapy

What is…Sports Therapy?

A lot of people didn’t know what sports therapy was when I graduated from my degree in 2010, both clients and professionals, so I was wrongly labelled ‘the physio’ or ‘sports massage therapist’. As a sports therapist, I do a bit of each of those jobs and the qualification I did is a holistic one covering lots of different components to help you get better as a whole, not just to make the injury better.

One downside to my title is the ‘sports’ part of ‘sports therapy’. A lot of the public think that you must be injured through sport to access sports therapy or at least play sport to come and be treated by me. This is not true and the reason why it is called sports therapy is because it was originally designed to be therapy at pitch side. The whole idea of having your tools with you at all times (your body) means that you can treat anywhere, you don’t even need massage oil really. No need for fancy machines, just you and your skills are all it takes. This is what I love about my job; it is adaptable to the person in front of you.

So, what exactly is involved in sports therapy? Well, I work with the musculoskeletal system meaning I work with the muscles, skeleton and connective tissue and look at the interaction between all of these structures. I do soft tissue work which involves massage, soft tissue release, myofascial release, IASTM, passive stretching and medical acupuncture. I also do joint mobilisation and exercise rehabilitation looking at how we can work together to get the body moving efficiently and in a pain free range. This is done after completing an assessment of your body’s movement and strength then we go through a personalised exercise routine written just for you to achieve your treatment goals.

The exact combination of treatment varies from person to person and also from treatment to treatment as the goals change slightly. It is a very tailored service like all of our other therapies in clinic and takes you right through your journey with your practitioner right by your side guiding you all the way.
If you would like to discuss booking in for sports therapy with Kirsty or any other therapy with the team, please call us on 0191 9082376 or book online at www.bodyworksclinic.org

Written by Kirsty Ritzema