Celebrate Movement!

National Physical Therapy Month was established to raise awareness of the benefits of Physical Therapy. This year’s theme is how PT can help improve physical activity. This is especially important because staying active and being able to go to the gym was difficult during the pandemic. Movement is medicine and physical therapists are your movement experts!

Benefits to Physical Activity

Regular physical activity has many benefits, including preventing and decreasing the effects of many chronic conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, obesity, and depression. Here are the top 10 things ChoosePT highlights that physical activity is able to do:

1. Improve your memory and brain function
2. Protect against many chronic diseases
3. Aid in weight management
4. Lower blood pressure and improve heart health
5. Improve your quality of sleep
6. Reduce feelings of anxiety and depression
7. Combat cancer-related fatigue
8. Improve joint pain and stiffness
9. Maintain muscle strength and balance
10. Increase life span

As physical therapists, our job is to help individuals manage or eliminate pain, prevent over reliance on medication and be an alternative to surgery. If surgery is the only option, then we also aid in the recovery process to get you back to the activities that you love.

Easy ways to get you moving!

Being active doesn’t mean that you need to start going to the gym. Rather, it can be as easy as going on a walk with a friend. Enjoy these wonderful fall temperatures and invite someone to go on a walk to look at the color of the changing leaves. Park a little further from the entrance to the grocery store. Take the stairs instead of the elevator at your work or home. If you want more of a challenge, try doing a few sit to stands every time you get up from a chair or go up onto your tippy toes 10 times when you are working at your kitchen counter.

Being active doesn’t have to be time consuming. Try to incorporate little things throughout your day to gently increase your heart rate and get your muscles moving. If you stay consistent, then soon they will be a habit!

Of course, if any aches or pains creep up, give us a call so we can get you back to being active and doing the things that you love!

Author

Alana Hamilton Alana Hamilton is a physical therapist at Advantage Physical Therapy in Falls Church, Virginia. She is a proud Hokie from Virginia Tech with a major in Biology and a minor in psychology and sociology. Following graduation, she immediately got her doctorate in Physical Therapy from Radford University. She is an avid fan of Pilates, running, and hiking. On the weekends, she can be found hanging out with her family and baby as well as doing Spartan races with her old physical therapy classmates and friends. She is a big believer that during rehabilitation, "Motion is the Lotion" and that staying active is key to remaining healthy.