Hawkes Physiotherapy Blog

Simply question: Will a brace or support help me? Well depending on who you speak, to you will hear yes and no but what is the real truth? Yes: Elastic bandaging can assist proprioceptive function of knee and ankle joint (Fousekis et al 2016). Patellofemoral braces appear to be effective for preventing anterior knee pain (Yeung et al 2011). Significant reduction in ankle sprains in people allocated external ankle supports: semi-rigid orthosis or air-cast brace (Quinn et al 1997). A brace may be helpful in managing immediate symptoms related to lateral epicondylalgia (tennis elbow) (Bisset et al 2014). No: Our systematic review found no conclusive evidence about the effectiveness of braces in medial knee osteoarthritis (Mine et al 2016). 15% of ankle sprain patients who used an ankle brace re-sprained, compared with 27% who did neuromuscular training (Janssen et al 2014). So not a simple answer then! No change there then!!! Simple answer is that it dep...

The human body is adaptable in both a negative and positive way. In the past, rest was prescribed for injury but was it the the right thing to do? Short answer: Probably not. Why? I feel better when I rest so that's good, right? Not necessarily. Think about it. Do your muscles get stronger with rest? Do your bones get stronger? Do your tendons?  Do you get fitter? No! In fact the opposite occurs. So that can't be good can it? Muller et al (1970 found that after 8 days of resting, muscle strength reduced by 2-6%. Most injuries are caused by cumulative overload to a structure, which basically means they are loaded beyond their physical strength. So taking this on board does rest work? No, because the tissue that is injured will actually get weaker, which of course, causes more of the same problem that actually caused the injury in the first place. A great example is the Achilles tendon. Here you have a structure that on average takes between 6-8 time...