Whether it is athletics, cycling, triathlon, badminton, tennis or rugby acupuncture is increasing becoming popular among professional and amateur sports people in way we treat sports injuries.
Suzanne and Sandra Cafferky, both registered ACI acupuncturists say that every month there is always someone coming in to our clinics with different levels of sports injury or prevention of injury. Whether it is on a professional, competitive or amateur level sports people today from all disciplines have discovered that incorporating regular use of acupuncture into a training regimen allows them to train harder, recover faster from tough workouts and increase their overall sports performance. This is because quite simply acupuncture increases the body’s ability to heal faster and maintain or improve the energy required for optimum performance. Professional athletes use acupuncture for these very attributes
David Gillick (www.davidgillick.com ) 400m Irish Olympic Athlete says:
‘As a full time professional athlete, my health is my wealth. I train 6 days a week putting in back to back session, so the importance to look after my body is essential. I first started using acupuncture as a treatment when I had incredibly tight calf muscles. The results were immediate, they relaxed straight away. Any time I had any tight muscles, acupuncture was the answer. I have also noticed how many other athletes are using acupuncture for both injury prevention as much as recovery.’
In acute/serious injuries the earlier a person receives acupuncture the faster they recover. Our experience shows in these cases the injuries expected recovery time can be reduced by anything up to 50% alongside stretching/gentle exercise. Therefore the acute conditions such as sprain, strain or stiffness can be resolved very fast without much loss of training time to the athlete…Full recovery can be also experienced from nagging or persistent injuries that impedes the athlete’s performance. This is because acupuncture treats not only the symptom of pain but also the root cause of these problems. This highlights its real strength; it also helps prevent future injury as well. By nourishing the tendons, ligaments and muscular system Thus, why more athletes are being treated to prevent injuries as well as to treat injuries.
Some common problems treated by acupuncture for the athlete and cyclist are with the legs, acute and nagging persistent injury to hamstrings and gastronemius muscles, tight ilio-tibia tract, partial ligamentous tears, knees, hips and , achilles tendonitis that can all cause pain, loss of motion and disrupt/halt their performance. Other sports injuries treated are sprains, strains, swelling and bruising, groin strain, rotator cuff injuries, knee pain, tennis elbow, golfers elbow.
Scott evans (www.scottevansireland.com) Professional and Olympic Irish Badminton player states: ‘I have used acupuncture quite a number of times in the past. The latest was with an ankle injury which healed very fast. Acupuncture helped remove the swelling and start the blood flow through my ankle quicker than any other treatment which helped me get back on court and back into training.’
Dr Vincent Carroll a Western Medical Doctor who is also trained in Traditional Chinese Medicine and who is founder of Lansdowne College of Acupuncture states:
‘Acupuncture is my preferred method of treatment for sports injuries and indeed for most skeletal muscular injuries as i consistently find that it gives better results than more conventional medicine in that it leads to quicker mobilization and less risk of any condition becoming chronic.. I now treat the vast majority of my sports injury clients by acupuncture.’
For a list of registered acupuncturists see www.tcmci.ie
Contact Details:
Suzanne Cafferky Drogheda 0877937771/Sandra Cafferky 0851079343
Dr Vincent Carrol 0872635161 www.lansdownecollege.ie
Hugh Cafferky – Silver Hatch Sports – Can be contact in relation to David Gillick and Scott Evans 0044 7519 660 532 www.silverhatchsports.com
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