Before we even begin talking about common hamstring injuries, let’s talk about some anatomy and get an understanding of what the hamstring even is and what it helps us do!
Your hamstring is the group of muscles in the back of the leg. The hamstring is made up of 3 muscles including the:
- semitendinosus
- semimembranosus
- biceps femoris
These muscles help flex the knee and extend the hip. These muscles are extremely important with the basic function of walking and are used in our everyday lives.
Hamstring injuries are a common athletic injury as well as a non-athletic injury and are very well recovered with a nonsurgical approach. They happen often with sprinting sports or activities such as: soccer, tennis, football or a similar sport to these.
Hamstring injuries can either be partial or full thickness tears.
When you have a partial tear, you have an incomplete tear, or minimal tearing / separation of the tendon from the bone. These types of tears have good outcomes with conservative treatments. Full tears are when you have a complete or full tear of the tendon from the bone and the muscle retracts and can require surgery depending on the severity of the injury.
No matter what kind of hamstring injury you have, they can be quite painful and cause impairments to your gait, ability to perform ADLs (activities of daily living), your recreational activities or even simple tasks such as sitting or standing for a period of time. When you have an injury like this, you may notice some:
- swelling
- sharp or shooting pain
- poor tolerance to putting weight through that leg
- bruising
How To Treat These Injuries:
If you or someone you know are currently experiencing pain or something like this, physical therapy is a great option to get you feeling better! When you go to PT, a Doctor of Physical Therapy will evaluate you and perform special tests and determine how severe the hamstring strain is and come up with a plan to get you back to your prior level of function.
If you are in the Northern Virginia area and are experiencing pain like noted above, give us a call at Loudoun Sports Therapy Center at 703-450-4300 to schedule your evaluation and get back to living a pain free life!
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