The consequences of brushing off a minor injury
From dancing/jumping to walking between stages to see different acts at a music festival, you may sustain a minor injury. It may only causes some pain that you feel either in the moment or the next morning.
Whether it be a rolled ankle or a head knock, all accidents and injuries are a deficit to your health and need to be assessed and treated to prevent it from progressing overtime.
Acute Injury
An injury is labelled acute when initially sustained. In this stage, it is common to experience symptoms within the first 2 weeks as the body uses inflammation to assist in the restoration of damaged tissues.
In saying this, sometimes you may not even feel pain but performing movements overtime may induce micro trauma to the tissue and make it become painful down the track. The acute injury can turn into a chronic impairment if not treated accordingly. This can be accompanied by pain lasting months or even years.
Chronic Injury
Once this injury has transitioned into the chronic category, pain can be quite persistent and unremitting and the damage is likely take longer to rehabilitate. In some cases, the pain experienced may not even be due to the initial damage to the tissue itself. Rather, it could be the result of a fault in the nervous system known as central sensitisation.
*Central Sensitisation
Central Sensitisation is a neurological disorder in which the neurons involved in detecting nociception (pain) are enhanced. This can result in the following:
- Allodynia: a disorder in which pain is triggered from stimulus that usually does not provoke pain
- Hyperalgesia: a condition in which a person has an increased response to pain
- Increased receptive field: response to stimuli outside of the area of injury provokes pain
If you suffer an injury at a festival or even in daily life and you believe it is only minor, don’t just brush it off. Call Pivotal Motion Physiotherapy on (07) 3352 5116 or book an appointment online. We can help assess and treat your injury before it potentially transitions into a chronic condition.
