Are you going to start doing sports? Know the importance of a good sports practice to avoid injuries and lean on the professionals.
Are you going to start doing sports? Before you start, you should know that poor sports practice can cause contractures and injuries, avoid them now!
The practice of physical activity and sport appropriate to each age and depending on the physical condition of each person is, in almost all cases, beneficial for health. However, if exercise is done incorrectly, it can have detrimental effects, from minor discomfort to serious muscle injury.
Physiotherapist and expert in heat therapy Pablo de la Serna recommends “following a training program supervised by professionals, preparing the body before starting the activity and not overdoing it so as not to overload the muscles.”
Exercise did carelessly and without regard to proper and correct techniques can compromise the skeletal, muscular, and nervous systems. In addition, excessive practice and poor technique can harm the health of those who practice sports. “Muscular pathologies can come from inadequate physical activity habits, either by default -if done wrong-, or due to excessive practice”, explains Pablo de la Serna.
Exercise did carelessly and without regard to proper and correct techniques can compromise the skeletal, muscular, and nervous systems.
Musculoskeletal pathologies can affect joints, muscles, and tendons. “These injuries, in addition to affecting thousands of people, can also disable those who suffer from them in their daily and work activities,” explains the physiotherapist.
For this reason, prevention is very important and, in this sense, “determining the risk factors can be of great help”, points out the expert.
It also highlights the importance of proper sports practice. “Accidents, malpractice when exercising and even the use of inappropriate clothing or equipment can be some of the causes of injuries in sports, from muscle inflammation to fractures.”
“Once people are clear that to be healthy they must take care of their diet and exercise, it is necessary to teach them how to do it to prevent new problems derived from improper practice.” De la Serna recommends the supervision of professionals: “more and more people are doing sports on their own, from going for a run to using sports machines at home, which can entail risks if there is no expert to indicate how they should perform the exercises correctly.
Likewise, it is important to “wear comfortable clothes, prepare the body and stretch before and after exercising, drink fluids to avoid dehydration and not overdo it to avoid overloading muscles and tendons,” he advises.
Listening to the body is essential and “if you feel pain when doing the activity, stop, since continuing to force it can cause greater damage.” If the discomfort persists, “it may be due to a contracture, which should be treated.” De la Serna states that “physiotherapy is a good solution, as well as using therapeutic thermal patches, which by generating constant heat for hours, increase blood flow, help relax muscles and relieve pain, thus helping the Recovery”.
If intense pain occurs when practicing sports and does not disappear at rest, “it is best to go to the doctor to rule out injuries or treat them if they exist,” he concludes. In these cases, in addition to following the prescribed treatment, either with analgesics or other recommendations, heat therapy can be an adjuvant in recovery since “heat accelerates the physiological repair of damaged tissues because it increases the elasticity of collagen, present, for example, in vascular tissues and muscles”, concludes the expert.