At Play On, we think every high school and club athlete would benefit from taking that pre-season sports physical to the next level. We know from the research that many athlete injuries are preventable. Some of the suspected precursors to those injuries can be identified early. The level of strength and motor control necessary to play high school or club sports, and survive them with less potential for injury, is something we can identify well before an athlete ever takes a field. Schedule an injury-reduction screening, learn more about how your body functions, let us identify the risks so you can apply corrections sooner, and Play On!

Schedule an appointment with Dr. Marci Curtis, DPT who owns and operates Play On Physical Therapy in Fishers, Indiana.

As a sport parent, you probably have on your mental agenda to get your student athlete an annual sports physical, as required by the state athletic association. While this physical covers screening for some health deficits that may make playing a sport dangerous for your child, it does not cover the thorough musculoskeletal screening provided by a comprehensive physical therapy evaluation. At Play On, we think every high school and club athlete would benefit from taking that pre-season exam to the next level. 

We know from the research that many athlete injuries are preventable. The level of strength and motor control necessary to play high school or club sports, and survive them with less potential for injury, is something we can identify before they ever take a field. 

Schedule an injury-reduction screening or impairment evaluation, learn more about how their body functions, let us identify the risks, apply corrections sooner, and watch them Play On!

Schedule an appointment with Dr. Marci Curtis, DPT who owns and operates Play On Physical Therapy in Fishers, Indiana.

It’s that time of year to prioritize post-season recovery and address problem areas that may have plagued your Summer or Fall athletes. A comprehensive physical therapy evaluation can identify and begin to tackle some of the movement, strength and motor control deficits that may be new or keep showing up for these players. 

As players progress in their performance and training, they often begin to hit barriers that require assistance. Continuing to load and push through, without correcting these impairments, can set them back vs. propel them forward. PT evaluation can address these barriers and find deficits they didn’t yet know were there. 

At Play On Physical Therapy, we can help. Don’t wait for your athletes to be sidelined to discover their problem areas. Encourage them to get an injury-reduction screening or impairment evaluation, learn more about how their body functions, find the barriers, apply corrections sooner, and Play On!

Schedule an appointment with Dr. Marci Curtis, DPT who owns and operates Play On Physical Therapy in Fishers, Indiana.

Hey, sports parent, have you ever seen your youth athlete come off the field complaining of heel or ankle pain somewhere that they didn't have before the game started? 

You never saw an injury: they didn’t get hit, they didn’t twist an ankle, they didn’t fall. It may not have even bothered them during the game, but something is now hurting that wasn’t before. There may not be any swelling or even tenderness in the area that hurts.It’s not uncommon for something like that to occur. Many times, these early symptoms get ignored for too long, because they can play through for awhile; or they are prematurely confused as tendonitis or other overuse injuries, with much time and money wasted on expensive tests and  interventions that attempt to treat the local symptoms, but miss the actual cause.Symptoms like these can be the fist sign there is weakness or movement impairment occurring elsewhere, remote to the location of pain. At Play On, we recognize patterns like this early, have seen them occur in a variety of running and cutting sport athletes. and understand that these can be harbingers of future injury, if not addressed appropriately.Recent examples have been in soccer, gymnastics, baseball, football, tennis, and basketball; but patterns like this can occur in any sport or activity that requires quick and frequent changes of direction, jumping, and running. If left unchecked, these athletes can eventually develop mechanical overuse changes at the tendons, muscles and bones of the foot and lower leg. They may even have motor control failures that lead to ankle sprains, fractures, or significant knee ligament injuries, that can end a season. We know approximately 70% of ACL tears are of this preventable nature, not due to direct trauma. And while we cannot prevent those trauma injuries, many of the warning signs to these overuse and motor control injuries can be found and addressed with a pre-season evaluation, before the first symptoms occur. Dr. Curtis tells a story about how her daughter played soccer for ten years, with no preventable injury. While many of her teammates were in tape and walking boots because of mechanical injuries, she had a symptom of outside ankle pain just a few times when coming off the field. I recognized it immediately as one of the precursor symptoms that can lead to further injury and gave her the appropriate exercises to manage the problem. I taught her what to watch for, and how to battle it back. The ankle symptom was reduced quickly, despite no direct intervention to the ankle, and she never ended up with an escalated injury.

Injury prevention is available … you just need to ask the right sources. >>>>> Dr. Marci Curtis, DPT owns and operates Play On Physical Therapy in Fishers, Indiana and is accessible via PlayOnPT.com for clinical referrals or direct access appointments.