If you’ve been involved in a car accident but haven’t been seriously injured, you’re probably putting more energy into figuring out how to pay your bills, deal with insurance paperwork or meet your transportation needs than you are into taking care of yourself. But the thing about injuries is that symptoms don’t always appear right away — and not taking care of minor injuries can easily cause them to escalate and cause major health problems down the road. For that reason, it’s important that if you’ve been involved in even a minor car accident, you be thinking about treatment and some physical rehab.
Why Physical Rehab Is Important
The simplest explanation as to why physical rehab is important is that it both addresses current problems and heads off future ones. The problem with car accidents is that people tend to write off aches and pains as normal and assume that they’ll go away on their own — not realizing that the reverse is often true, instead. Without treatment for back pain, headaches, even knee or foot pain, the underlying issues caused by car accidents are far more likely to cause chronic conditions. The goal of physical rehab should be to make sure you don’t experience decreased function and mobility, as so many car accident victims do.
Post-Accident Physical Rehab Options
So what kind of care should you be thinking about? Seeing a traditional physician isn’t your only option; in fact, it might not be your best one. An M.D. is far more likely to prescribe some painkillers and have you wait the issue out than to examine tissue-specific problems. A chiropractic doctor is one good choice, since chiropractors are experts in the joints and tissues that tend to be most affected in car accidents. You might also want to consider a combined treatment plan including adjustments, massages, at-home exercises, etc.
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