Is your child scheduled for an upcoming surgery and your concerned about them bouncing back from it well—or even hopeful that they’ll end up feeling stronger than before?
Our highly skilled and experienced team of physical therapists can guide your child through the entire pre-surgical and post-surgical process so that you can maximize your child’s outcomes and make the most out of any type of invasive procedure.
What is post-surgical rehab and what are the benefits?
Both pre- and post-surgical rehab are essential elements to successful patient outcomes. Post-surgical rehab with a physical therapist is especially important in order to make sure things go smoothly after your child’s operation is done. This is because any type of surgery is a form of trauma and can affect the body differently. Even minor and uncomplicated surgical procedures can have a major impact on your child’s health.
Individualized post-surgical rehab with a physical therapist not only minimizes your child’s pain and accelerates your child’s rate of healing (and return to sport or work). It also reduces the chances of post-operative complications including infections, bleeding, blood clots, muscle weakness, scar tissue, decreased function, and other factors which can negatively impact your child’s long-term health.
Another critical reason for electing post-surgical physical therapy is that it can help reduce or completely avoid prescription pain killers, including opioids. An opioid epidemic is currently gripping the country and impacting every socioeconomic class. According to the CDC, an estimated 115 people every day die from opioid overdose, and upwards of 29% of people prescribed opioids will end up misusing these dangerous drugs!
For this reason, the CDC advises people to choose physical therapy over prescription painkillers whenever possible.
After surgery, your child may need to learn how to do some things all over again (even things like walking and dressing themselves), either to accommodate healing tissues and/or to avoid recurring dysfunction. Our physical therapist can teach your child how to perform tasks safely while following critical post-operative guidelines which are often outlined by the surgeon.
How Physical Therapy Helps in Post-Surgical Rehab
No matter what the particular surgery may be, you can rely upon a physical therapist to get your child moving again. Our physical therapy team is here to help families make sense of confusing medical terms and learn the right progressions of exercises and activities to maximize post-surgical recovery!
Instead of masking pain, physical therapy helps resolve your child’s pain and other impairments. We do this through techniques such as joint mobilizations, home exercise programs, and non-invasive modalities including therapeutic ultrasound, electrical stimulation, and cold laser therapy.
Depending on your child’s post-operative environment, a physical therapist can also help problem solve how to safely get in and out of a car, up and down stairs, in and out of bed, and so on while protecting your child’s healing surgical site and keeping them safe. We can give you adaptive tools to compensate for reduced movement while at the same time working with your child’s body to restore normal range of movement as quickly as possible.
Lastly, our physical therapy team can also educate your family about lifestyle and nutritional techniques to optimize your child’s healing and health in the long-term. That way, they’ll be far more likely to avoid re-injury, recurrent surgeries, and prolonged downtime.
Feeling anxious about your child’s upcoming surgery? Contact our Oceanside, CA physical therapy clinic today to schedule a post-surgical consultation and set your child’s up for post-operative success!
