How Does Shockwave Therapy Work?
Shockwave therapy is a multidisciplinary device used in orthopaedics, physiotherapy, sports medicine, urology and veterinary medicine. Its main assets are fast pain relief and mobility restoration. Together with being a non-surgical therapy with no need for painkillers makes it an ideal therapy to speed up recovery and cure various indications causing acute or chronic pain.
MECHANISM OF ACTION
Shockwave is an acoustic wave which carries high energy to painful spots and myoskeletal tissues with subacute, subchronic and chronic conditions. The energy promotes regeneration and reparative processes of the bones, tendons and other soft tissues. Shockwaves are characterized by jump change in pressure, high amplitude and non-periodicity. The kinetic energy of the projectile, created by compressed air, is transferred to the transmitter at the end of the applicator and further into the tissue.
MEDICAL EFFECTS
Acoustic waves with high energy peak used in Shockwave therapy interact with tissue causing overall medical effects of accelerated tissue repair and cell growth, analgesia and mobility restoration. All the processes mentioned in this section are typically employed simultaneously and are used to treat chronic, sub-acute and acute (advanced users only) conditions.
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What else can be done to help?
- Things like reducing heel height, increasing toe space, having appropriate support and a nice firm sole, proper fixation are all things that can help. It may sound simple but even correct shoe fitting is something that not every person has. Sometimes people value fashion over health or have just never been fitted properly.
- Another important thing to consider is strength and conditioning:
- What condition are the small muscles in your foot and under your arch in?
- What are the muscles in your lower legs working like?
- How much movement is there through the joints in your feet? Are they rigid? Flexible?
- How is your ankle joint range of motion?
- Are tight calves an issue?
- Another thing worthy of consideration is would you benefit from orthotic intervention, to slow down the rate at which your bunions will progress? To improve your knee alignment, to help with your lower back?
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