5 reasons to Use Force Plates in Injury Rehabilitation
Force plates are a really cool piece of technology that can measure force production, weight distribution, power, strength and speed in real time! The objective data it provides can help us create baseline measurements, track your progress, identify deficits and test your readiness to return to your activities. In this blog, we will review 5 ways how force plates can make a difference in your injury rehabilitation.
1— Measure strength
Objective data can help us track your recovery and allows us to take the guessing out of the decision making process. Having a clear understanding about side to side differences in your strength following an injury is immensely helpful.
For example, after an Achilles rupture, we can measure your calf strength. We can compare your values:
to your healthy side,
to the same side over time,
and to the Achilles rupture population
2— Measure your springiness and your ability to hop and jump
We can test different jumps like countermovement jump, multi rebound jumps, drop jump etc. By measuring these jumps, we can determine how well you can use your “brakes” and “engines” (braking and propulsive forces, respectively), and how you can generate power and springiness. It can be very motivating to see changes over time in the metrics we are tracking.
After an ACL injury or an Achilles rupture it is very common to deal with limited strength and endurance. Testing at different fatigue levels can tell us how your numbers are changing when you are fresh and rested vs when you are fatigued. Since most re-injuries happen later in the game when you are a little more fatigued, force plates can give us valuable information regarding your readiness to play.
3—Assessing Balance, Stability and Weight Distribution
Force plates can measure how well you maintain your balance. By standing on the plate, therapists can assess how your weight is distributed and how much it shifts when you’re standing still or moving. This helps in diagnosing balance issues and monitoring improvements over time.
Testing your balance and weight distribution while performing simple movements are typically the first tests we introduce following an injury. Our patients find the visual feedback immensely helpful.
In the picture below we asked our patient to perform a few squats following a knee injury. The yellow circle shows the changes in weight distribution over the left vs the right plate. You can see a large side-to-side difference, which indicates significant compensation patterns and guarding.
Initial testing: weight distribution during body weight squats
When patients see this, they can be more aware of what’s happening in their body while they are making those compensations and learn to adjust.
4– Tracking Progress
By using the force plate regularly, therapists can track changes and improvements in your physical condition. This helps in adjusting your therapy plan based on real data rather than just subjective observations.
Going back to the example above, the picture below is the same patient performing a few squats 4 weeks later. You can see a very similar pattern on the left vs right side. In this case, the patient did not show any signs of favouring or guarding the injured knee and we progressed her exercises by adding weight.
Weight distribution during body weight squats 4 weeks after the initial testing
An Achilles or an ACL injury rehabilitation takes months of dedicated rehab. Seeing objective improvements can help keep motivation levels high. On the other hand, pin pointing areas in need of improvement can help us in the decision-making process regarding returning to activities and sports.
Every sport requires different skills, for instance a volleyball player performs many vertical jumps throughout the game, but you have some time to recover between points. This puts a different load on the injured region compared to a soccer player who is constantly moving, changes directions all the time but doesn’t jump as much (compared to a volleyball or basketball player).
Using force plates, we can select specific jumps, metrics and testing protocols that are most relevant to your sport and track those changes over time!
5— Customizing Rehab Programs
The data from the force plate helps in designing tailored rehabilitation programs. For instance, if you are recovering from a meniscus injury, we can use the data to target specific areas for strengthening or adjusting your movement patterns to avoid re-injury. If the metrics show that you are offloading during the landing phase of the jumps, we give you specific exercises to help that.
Force plates provide us valuable information regarding your “brakes” and “engines” that are usually hard to see with a naked eye. For example, when we started testing jumps in our Achilles rupture population, we noticed that some of our patients had significant deficits in the braking (eccentric) part of the jumps. This led us to introduce “drop and pop” type of exercises to improve those metrics and quality of jumps!
Summary
In summary, using force plates during your injury rehabilitation can elevate your experience and enhance the recovery process by adding much needed objective information. We can measure your strength, balance, plyometric abilities, and track changes over time. The data helps us select specific exercises and tailor your program.
Are you interested in the force plates? Book an appointment with us below.
