Most people are familiar with the idea that when you are injured, Physical Therapy helps you restore mobility and strength. If you have back pain, hip pain, knee pain or shoulder pain from injuries, most people understand that its important to restore range of motion and strength.
But in this article I want to talk about Motor Control.
Very often with injury a person changes how they move. Sometimes that looks like a limp, favoring one side, or avoiding certain parts of range of motion within a joint. Usually this pattern starts very naturally because of pain. But over time it can become an ingrained habit.
Some other examples are hiking your shoulder up a little more when lifting things or pressing overhead, shifting your hip a certain way in a squat, or changing how your foot hits the ground when you walk or run.
Motor Control is the ability to control movement. It is how well your nervous system can process and use sensory information for the execution of voluntary movement.
It can be called body awareness, proprioception, or movement quality.
When your Motor Control is altered after an injury, sometimes that new habit can be your body’s way of thinking it still needs to protect itself even years after an injury. But ironically, this very compensation can cause pain to persist. And sometimes, it can impair function and athletic performance.
So addressing these alterations in movement patterns can be a critical part of the rehab process.
Research studies have looked into the effectiveness of Motor Control exercises and how they affect pain and function, and some have shown positive results. (see references below)
To be honest, Motor Control is a difficult thing to do studies on as it is hard to quantify and measure. Assessments of it is often qualitative. What constitutes a “Motor Control” exercise can vary quite a bit study to study as well. The protocols are not standardized.
I fully acknowledge this nuance and that more research is needed, specifically research that finds ways to measure it more precisely.
But in the meanwhile, based off studies that have already been done showing some potential promise, along with my clinical experience of working with injured people who simply move differently, I strongly believe it is a worthy pursuit. And I have seen it help many people with a variety of injuries.
After injury, we want to make sure that you can control and execute movement in the way that is most efficient and effective for your body so that ultimately you can do the activities you love without pain.
If you are dealing with a chronic injury and feel like your movement just feels off or wonky, this might be just what you need to bounce back.
Motor Control exercises come in all shapes and sizes but the goal of them is paying attention, tuning in to feel movement, starting slow (progressing with speed over time), and personalizing it to exactly where you have limitations.
Give us a call if you think this might be what you need and we can chat and learn more about your story and see if we can help you out.
References:
The Association of Scapular Kinematics and Glenohumeral Joint Pathologies
