Dance Medicine Blog Posts

If you’ve been keeping up with our blog posts you’ve already learned that the foot and ankle is the most common body part injured in dancers. Maybe you haven’t sprained your ankle before, but you’ve had annoying pain at the back part of your ankle. We’re going to dig a little deeper into some of the common diagnoses associated with pain at the back part of your ankle specifically while your foot is in what we refer to as plantarflexed in physical therapy or what you may know

It’s nearing time to sign up for next year’s classes, and you are considering adding a pointe class. But how do you know if you’re ready? Well, your ballet teacher this year feels you’re ready, you are 13 years old, you’ve been taking ballet classes for the past 4 years, and would love to continue dancing for many years to come and can’t wait to start pointe work. It should be as simple as that, right? Not exactly.  As demanding as dancing en pointe is, there are no standards

So you’ve been dealing with this aggravating ache in your lower leg for the past few weeks now. It happens as soon as you work on any type of jumping or leaps in your classes or practice, but now it has started to hurt while walking around at school. This could really be a problem for your upcoming competition next weekend. What are you going to do? Does this sound familiar at all? Those aches and pains that don’t get better on their own in a week or two can be so frustrating

Of course injuries happen to athletes all the time, but especially in the artistic athlete world there can be a significant amount of pressure to continue participating despite the pain, soreness, snapping/popping, etc. Maybe you and your fellow athletes don’t always talk about it, but there are likely many others in the same boat as yourself dealing with various kinds of injuries. Many times these injuries are related to overuse with the majority involving the lower limb. So

Are you taking time before your class to include some type of warm-up before you start your class? Is this something you do on your own, or is it led by your teacher, instructor, or coach? Performing a proper warm-up can be a crucial part of preventing injuries in dance, cheerleading, gymnastics, and many other athletic activities for that matter! At Graceful PT, not only are we here to help you rehabilitate your injury, but we are here to help you prevent them in the first p

Dancers and artistic athletes are notorious for experiencing injuries throughout their season, but are also known to continue to push through the pain and just deal with it. Does this sound like something you have done in the past, or maybe you are pushing through things now? There can be a lot of pressure to perform and participate in your dance classes, competitions, and rehearsals. The mental load, stress, and anxiety dancers may experience when dealing with an injury may

Sure, you’ve probably heard of physical therapy, you’ve driven past clinics around town, and maybe you’ve even spent time in physical therapy for an injury in the past, but did you know that there are physical therapists who specialize in treating dancers and artistic athletes?! Physical therapy is such a diverse profession, there are many types of providers who work with very specific types of patients. When you see a provider who specializes in something that you do, this w

Have you ever dealt with snapping or popping in your hip during dance? Maybe it is painful, maybe you just need to move your hip around a bit for it to go away, or maybe it’s annoying and happens each time you lift your leg above your hip during class… It is very possible that you have experienced snapping or popping at your hip especially if you are a ballet dancer. A research study found that approximately 90% of the ballet dancers in their study reported experiencing eithe

Having the ideal turn-out is always something that dancers are striving for in ballet. But how do you know if you are doing this safely? Achieving as close to 180 degrees of turn-out at the lower extremities is considered the ideal turn-out motion for the majority of ballet dancers. Understanding how your anatomy will contribute to this range of motion will be important in learning how to improve your turn-out motion. Research has shown that approximately 60% of the turn-out