| 24 June 2010
Sports injuries affect almost everyone regardless of whether you are an elite athlete or a weekend warrior. Ankle sprains are injuries that we often see with our vertical athletes like basketball and volleyball players. These injuries also occur in the general population even when moving at slow speeds. For example, steeping off of a curb wrong or stepping in a hole walking your dog are two scenarios where patients have sprained their ankles this week. The level or grade of the injury varies depending on the tissue that was injured.
Although many classification systems for grading lateral ankle sprains exist, perhaps the most common system is based on the clinical examination. In this system, grade I ankle sprains are painful, but they have no increased laxity when compared with the uninjured side. This correlates with mild stretching of the ATFL. Grade II ankle sprains are painful and have an increased laxity on testing. This correlates with a complete tear of the ATFL and a partial tear of the CFL. Grade III ankle sprains are usually painful and have an unstable ankle joint on examination. This correlates with complete ruptures of both the ATFL and CFL.
A sprain of the syndesmotic ligament complex is sometimes called a "high ankle sprain" (a type of inversion sprain) and often presents with anterior ankle pain. The syndesmotic ligament complex consists of the ATFL, the PTFL, and the distal interosseous membrane between the tibia and the fibula.
In plantar flexion, the talus of the ankle is more susceptible to inversion forces compared with dorsiflexion, in which the talus is more stable because of bony stabilization in the mortise. In plantar flexion, the ATFL is under tension and is susceptible to injury.
Eighty-five percent of ankle injuries are sprains, and of those sprains, 85% are lateral inversion sprains. Although athletes usually recover quickly from ankle sprains, failure to appropriately rehabilitate these injuries imposes an increased risk for future injury.
The most common ankle injury is a lateral sprain that is caused by inversion of the foot, with more than 25,000 occurring each day. Lateral inversion sprains are also the most commonly seen sports injury, comprising 14-21% of sports injuries. Athletes who participate in basketball, volleyball, soccer, and football are at especially high risk for ankle sprains, comprising 25-45% of the injuries in these sports.
Treatment of ankle sprains has evolved over the years and at South West Health, we utilize the latest equipment to help get you back in the game. Cold Laser is one of the key components to the treatment along with Kinesio Taping, bracing and of course ice.
Cold laser therapy works by increasing the levels of serotonin to help your body heal itself. The therapy is noninvasive and non-thermal. The cold laser was derived from phototherapy, a light healing method developed more than 30 years ago. In phototherapy, a special type of light penetrates the surface of the skin as well as underlying tissues to stimulate natural healing in the body. The low level laser light used in cold laser therapy is actually the compressed light of a wavelength from the red part of the light spectrum, or the cold part.
During the cold laser process, the body's cells are exposed to photon energy, which in turn increases the cells' metabolism, helps to develop muscle tissue and collagen, improves blood circulation, stimulates tissue repair and the healing of wounds, and stimulates the nervous and immune systems.
For more information on cold laser or to inquire about treatment of a sports injury, contact one of our concierges at 949-631-5226 ext 10.
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