All right, well now that the
Olympics are over and you've
watched all those athletes,
isn't it incredible to think
about how much goes into keeping
their bodies and tip top shape?
Well, sports medicine.
It's not just for the athletes.
It's for us regular people too,
especially if you've suffered an injury.
I spoke with Doctor Camille
Clinton and orthopedic surgeon at
Evergreen Health Sports Medicine
in Kirkland to learn more.
Women and girls are more likely to get ACL
tears for any given sport right. Quick
question doc. Will you explain
what an ACL tear is or meniscus
tear is? Yes, so the ACL
is there's four ligaments
that helps stabilize the knee.
The ACL is one of the ligaments
in the middle of the day.
It's also called the anterior cruciate
ligament and it prevents the tibia or
the leg bone from moving forward too
far and it also helps with rotational
stability of the knee and the meniscus
or cartilage pads in the knee.
So they help with.
Distributing load and kind of shock
absorption as well as stability in the knee.
As women age,
there's some specific types of
meniscus tears that women are more
likely to get meniscus root tears.
Women are more actually likely
to get arthritis in their knees.
Also tell a femoral issues both instability
and pain are more common in women.
Shoulder injuries are a little bit
different in women than in men.
Movement have more laxity so that
can produce both under certain
issues in her shoulders,
and then things like stress
fractures are more common
in women's Ian.
What's so crazy to me is that
I have so many female friends.
They've all had shoulder problems
after doing something too aggressive.
Like maybe a sport or even moving.
Why are these?
Injuries more common in
women than anyone else?
Well, women
have underlying more laxity
than men in general,
and so the joints move a little bit more,
which can put more stress on joints.
Women also the Bony structure is
different in women than in men.
That's more relevant for the knees,
even in the shoulders.
And then there's also strength
differences between men and women
and the balance of different muscle
groups are different in that can
predispose to injuries as well. Got
it so you know at that
I'm asking 'cause I'm 40.
I'm just wondering how does age and
lifestyle play a factor in these
things so I know not to go play tennis?
Well, you shouldn't not go play tennis.
But I I think that what's important
is that as we all age and to continue
to work on the basic things,
we need to work a little bit more.
Some of the basic strengthening exercises.
Then we did with mirror teenagers.
We need to warm up and also stretching,
even though women in general and were LAX,
everyone gets tighter as they age,
and so stretching is
another way to prevent those
injuries. It's a really good idea,
it's true, it's it's funny how
quickly you get this side aches now.
Are these injuries preventable?
I mean yes and no will never.
I mean, we're never gonna probably
make the world injury free.
That would be great.
So in women specifically,
I mean the most researches around ACL
injuries and there's excellent research
that ACL injuries are preventable.
And there are things there are factors
that we can't control that predispose
females to getting ACL injuries.
You know, we can't control the fact that
our pelvis is tend to be wider or that
we have different hormones in men do.
Or those type of factors.
But the muscle balance and
women is different.
So women tend to be more
quadricep dominant than men,
and so the hamstrings aren't as strong
and hamstring strength is protective
specifically for knee injuries.
Also, women tend to do things differently,
so and again, this is most studied in knees.
By far,
and so women tend to land from jumps
more upright and tend to cut him
pivot in a more upright position,
and so those are factors that
we can address so we can work
on hamstring strengthening.
And there's good exercise programs
that work on kind of plyometrics
and core strength, and doing,
cutting, pivoting, jumping,
jump,
landing in better positions,
and those have been proven
to decrease the risk of ACL
injuries. Interesting that
that is valuable information.
Thank you for sharing that.
If we don't go do that prep work and we
do end up getting an injury, what do
we do? You know you can ice and
take ibuprofen and rest it.
Obviously if something happens
and your leg turns blue or
you can't walk or something,
then go to the ER.
But most of those things you can
wait on and then you know the
next week you know get in and see
someone OK. Alright,
so it doesn't like if you don't
get treatment right away.
It's not going to affect the outcome,
correct? Correct, right?
OK, you're with Evergreen
house specifically.
What is your process like for
diagnosis and then a treatment plan?
So when a patient comes into my office
then we see them, we get X rays here.
We haven't actually here.
If we need to get X rays on someone,
I examine them.
Whether it's her shoulder or knee and
obviously talk about what happened.
If we need to get additional imaging,
we have an MRI that we can get this show
imaging at if they need physical therapy.
We have physical therapists here as well
as there's multiple physical therapists.
The community.
And then depending on what they need,
we kind of go from there.
Bottom line is don't ignore an injury,
don't you know?
Wait till your shoulder is so bad
that you're going to need surgery.
So if you need any help or you know
someone who needs help with an injury,
just like to improve your Wellness,
please visit the website on your screen.
Well, I'm feeling pretty lucky in
the wardrobe department right now.
Up next how I'm getting new outfits
every week at a fraction of the price
and how you can too will be right back.
This portion of New Day Northwest
is sponsored by Evergreenhealth.