No matter your activity level, you can be at risk of orthopedic injuries if you aren’t careful. Athletes are more susceptible to overuse injuries or those sustained during training and competitions, whereas non-athletes can suffer from injuries spurred on by underutilizing their bodies, which allows strength and flexibility to fade.

In order to protect yourself from orthopedic injuries, no matter your activity level, there are key steps you can take to keep your bones and joints healthy and injury-free.

Tips to Avoid Orthopedic Injuries

Our mission at Orthopedic Associates is to not just treat orthopedic injuries but to provide you with guidance that prevents them from occurring in the first place. While you can schedule an appointment for personalized suggestions based on your activity level, sport, or health conditions, the following are general tips to help you avoid orthopedic injuries.

Maintain a Healthy Weight

When it comes to protecting your body, keeping your weight within a healthy range can go a long way in maintaining your joint health. This is because when you carry excess weight, it can compress your joints, potentially causing your joint cartilage to wear down and leaving your joints prone to injury and pain.

To protect your joints from unnecessary wear, keep your weight within a healthy range.

Stay Active

Everyone can benefit from being active, even those who do not play a sport. Older adults, in particular, are more susceptible to immobility, which can cause weakening of their muscles and bones, increasing the risk of injury.

To keep up the strength in your body, be sure to incorporate strength training, cardiovascular exercise, and flexibility work into your weekly rotation—all three hit key areas of your physical health. Exercise, in general, strengthens the muscles around your joints, reducing the stress and strain your joints experience and offering them protection, but each type offers its own benefits: weight-bearing exercises help to increase bone density, cardiovascular exercise improves blood flow and strengthens your heart, and flexibility work can help ease tension in your muscles, allowing you to experience your complete range of motion.

A challenge that athletes may face is incorrectly assuming they’re active enough even though their training hits only one or two of these exercise types. To maintain your strength and mobility, be sure to incorporate all three.

Warm Up and Cool Down

Warming up and cooling down are key elements of a workout that shouldn’t be omitted if you’re looking to avoid orthopedic injuries. This is because working out when your joints and muscles haven’t warmed up yet can result in the overexertion of stiff muscles, which can lead to injury.

On the opposite side of your workout, taking time to cool down lets your heart rate and blood pressure slowly lower to the levels you see before your workout.

To protect your body’s health, don’t forget a quick 5-minute warm-up and cool-down.

What To Do If You’re Injured

Sometimes, you may take all the precautions that you can, but injuries can still happen. If you find yourself injured, don’t hesitate to schedule an appointment with an orthopedic specialist—the sooner you are evaluated, the sooner you can start treatment, preventing further injury from occurring.

At Orthopedic Associates, we have specialists for each joint, ensuring you’re always matched with an expert on your injury type. For a hip or knee injury, Ryan Caufield, M.D. is available to help, while Eric J. Lindberg, M.D. specializes in foot and ankle injuries.

Schedule an appointment today to see the best orthopedic specialists.