The ligaments around our ankle joint play a key role in stabilizing the joint and allowing for normal foot and ankle function. When one or more of these ligaments are damaged or torn, this stability decreases, making normal movement more challenging and increasing your risk of a subsequent injury.
Rest alone won’t help these ligaments get back to a pre-injury level of fitness, so you’ll have to be proactive if you want to restore your injured ankle ligaments. In today’s blog, we spotlight three ways we often work with patients to bring their ankle ligaments back to full health.
Ankle Ligament Restoration
Let’s look at three of the most common ways that an orthopedic specialist can help a patient repair mild to severe ankle ligaments tears:
1 – Proactive Physical Therapy – Proactive physical therapy is the most common treatment option for mild to moderate ankle ligament tears. If there’s a chance that surgery can be avoided, your specialist will likely recommend a conservative course that leans heavily on physical therapy and other functional movement exercises. Over the course of a number of weeks or months based on the extent of your tears, you will use targeted PT exercises to gradually improve the strength, flexibility and overall function of your injured ankle ligaments. Studies have shown that conservative care focused primarily on targeted physical therapy has fantastic results for helping patients return to a pre-injury level of function. Just be sure you see your rehab through to the end and don’t settle for “good enough” when it comes to your ankle health.
2. Reinforcing Damaged Ligaments – In some instances, a minimally invasive surgical procedure may be performed to reinforce partially torn ankle ligaments. Nearby ligaments may be overlapped or ligaments from another part of the body or from a donor may be harvested and used to reinforce ligament strength. Following the procedure, you can expect to pursue months of targeted physical therapy to slowly bring these tissues back up to full strength.
3. Ligament Anchoring – For partially or fully torn ligaments, the doctor may help move the recovery process along through a technique called anchoring. With this procedure, the damaged ligament is secured to the bone using surgical hardware or sutures. This artificial anchoring holds the ligament in place so that healing can begin to run its course. This ensures that the ligament heals attached to the correct location to continue providing stability and support to the entire ankle complex. When there are concerns about the torn ligament’s ability to heal without intervention, a minimally invasive suturing procedure may give the body the boost it needs to kickstart an optimal recovery process.
Let us help you overcome a new or chronic ankle ligament injury. For more information on how you can treat your specific ankle ligament damage, consider connecting with Dr. Silverman’s office today.