What is Sports Medicine Acupuncture?

Sports acupuncture is a general term used to describe the application of acupuncture to treat sports or activity-related injuries. 

While there is no regulatory board to set guidelines for what exactly makes a “sports acupuncturist”, practitioners are welcome to use such a term if their experience and background align with this specialist area.

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) treats pain by removing obstructions and treating disharmonies. Historically, TCM has been utilised to treat pain and injuries of all varieties – with no specific focus on sports-related injuries. 

More recently, acupuncture’s brilliance in treating sports-related injuries along side many other things such as hay-fever, migraine, chronic fatigue syndrome and much more has been noticed. Acupuncture can be utilised to accelerate the healing process and can produce excellent results for treating sports injuries, especially when combined with modern sports medicine. 

The foremost aim of sports acupuncture should be to enhance the field of sports medicine with traditional Chinese medicine. To become a proficient sports acupuncturist, the practitioner must master not only TCM and sports medicine, but also a variety of highly effective acupuncture techniques that can dramatically improve clinical outcomes.

One study from Utah State University, aimed to investigate the effect of acupuncture on both musculoskeletal injuries and athletic performance. The study drew a few conclusions, including that “acupuncture may be capable of stimulating post-exercise recovery“.

How Does Sports Medicine Acupuncture Work?

By balancing parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems, TCM is able to increase patients’ ability to handle inflammation and in turn, improve the patient’s health. 

Treating an injury is more than just addressing the area of the body where it occurred — other factors should also be factored in. There are many potential causes of a specific injury, and only through careful analysis of these contributing factors will you be able to both fully heal your injured body part and resolve any associated symptoms that may have resulted from the injury.

How Do You Become a Sports Acupuncturist?

Sports acupuncturists must be well-versed in traditional Chinese medicine and sports medicine. Most patients who come to see these practitioners want help with injuries from their beat on the court, field, or mat. Sports therapists can treat those ailments by leveraging acupuncture, which addresses the root of a patient’s pain — not just his or her symptoms.

Combining TCM & Sports Medicine Assessment Techniques

Sports medicine is a field that blends many different disciplines — making it a complex area of study. To become competent at it, you’ll have to understand the depths of orthopaedic evaluations and manual muscle testing, among other important topics.

The Importance of Assessment

An effective assessment is an integral part of any treatment plan. A proper assessment will get you to a proper diagnosis, which leads you to the best way to treat your patient or athlete.

A thorough assessment of client information is often critical in achieving good and great results. A practitioner who assesses a client’s history, symptoms, and pathologies won’t be as likely to implement random treatments or therapies that may not help his patient. In contrast, the practitioner who does perform in-depth assessments will be able to prescribe more effective treatment and therapy for his client — which will result in better clinical outcomes.

When practising TCM, it is important to properly integrate sports medicine treatment principles into building a treatment plan for your patient. These principles include the following:

• Developing a treatment plan based on each person’s constitution (body type)
• Managing bruising and swelling, as well as inflammation
• Reducing muscle spasms, pain, and tension in muscles and ligaments.

This will ensure your patient’s recovery is optimal.

The treatment plan is devised from the practitioner’s evaluation and hypothesis of what treatment approach will yield a positive outcome for the patient.

Specialising in Sports Acupuncture

Sports acupuncturists have been in the spotlight after the positive effects of sports acupuncture have been increasingly acknowledged. Sports acupuncturists from all over world continue to bring their expertise, knowledge, and skills to athletes everywhere.

The research around TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) is expansive and continues to grow, especially with our rapidly advancing digital world. As scientists discover more about the mechanisms of acupuncture, the complexity of pain biology, or how our nervous systems respond to injury, this new knowledge can be used by practitioners to offer even better treatments for their patients.

Lower Limb Bio-mechanic Course

Our lower limb biomechanics course is evidence-based and designed to be an informative CPD update for MSK practitioners, whilst also meeting the needs of less experienced practitioners wanting to work in the biomechanics field. Learn more here.