hey everybody its Doctor Jo and Bee-Remy. isn't she the bee's knees? or in this
case today, the bee's ankles. today I'm going to show you seven ways to treat an
ankle sprain. so let's get started.
so these treatments are for an ankle sprain that's early on. so when you just want to
start getting some movement, but nothing too strenuous quite yet. you're just
trying to get that movement to help get some of that swelling out of there and
that irritation out there. so one of the first ways to start is a really great
thing to do is stretching out your calves because if you've got an ankle
injury or a sprain a lot of times your calves will tighten up. so an easy way to
stretch the calves, and you can stretch your calves a whole bunch of different
ways, it's just using a strap to stretch it. I like putting a little roll
underneath my ankle right there because then I have movement in that heel. you
don't have to, but I think you'll just get a better stretch better movement
when you do that or you can just prop it off the edge of a couch or a bed or
off of a table if you want to just so you have that movement in there. so take
something like a stretch strap or a dog leash, but lots of times it has a loop it
works the best. you want to put it around the ball of your foot. you don't want to
be high up on your toes because it's probably gonna slip off and you don't
want it to be low down by your arch because you're not going to get a really
good stretch. so you want to completely relax your foot. you're doing all the
stretching or the movement with the strap that you have. so I'm just gonna
pull and get that stretch. so right now I'm feeling a stretch underneath where
the calf muscles are. so depending on your sprain, depending on how much
irritation you have in there, you might not be able to pull very hard. but with a
stretch you don't want it to be painful. you want it to be comfortable. so just
get that nice tension feeling, but no pain while you're doing this stretch. you
will hold that stretch for 30 seconds, relax, and then do that a total of three
times. so you can do the stretches several times throughout the day as long
as it's not irritating it. so then the next one that
you're gonna do is just what you would call ankle circles. so again having it
where your heel is not touching the floor or touching something is best
because you're gonna have more movement in your ankle. if I just had it on the
floor, I can still do it, but it's just a little bit harder to get that motion in
there. so the ankle circles are just exactly how they sound. you're just gonna
try to make a circle at your ankle. but it's not your whole leg. you're not
moving like this the the leg part should be staying still, and you should really
try and get that movement at the ankle because what you're doing is with the
spring you're trying to keep that movement so it doesn't scar up and
tighten up. but you're not trying to do a lot of movement where you're just gonna
irritate it more. so you have to kind of find that happy middle ground. but
movement just at the ankles. so you're making I would say ten circles one way
and then reverse it and do ten circles the other way. so same kind of thing, you
can do ten, you can do two sets of ten of each, but you can do this several times
throughout the day as long as you feel like it's not irritating it even more. so
you just have to depends on what grade your sprain is. it's a little bit
different for everybody. so then the next one is just using something like an
ankle wrap. and ankle wraps are really great because not only does it give it a
little bit of a support, but it also gives you some compression. so if you
have some swelling in there it helps work it out. so I'm going to use the
ankle wrap from braceability, and this is their neoprene ankle wrap, and it's
really nice because again it's not a brace per se, it's not gonna stabilize
your ankle, but it's not just to give compression in there. and so all wraps or
some sometimes they are called braces are a little bit different. but most of
the time it wraps around your ankle and then you have two straps that kind of
cross. and so that's usually the way most of them work. they've got a little
opening for your heel which is nice because you can just kind of put your
heel there and get your foot flat on the ground. now generally if you're sitting
that's a little bit better because you want to have your ankle kind of in that
neutral position. if you can get it there I'm just a since I'm on the floor going
to show you this way, but you usually start the wrap at the bottom / so you can
get that nice and stabilized. and so then if you wanted to put your heel up like
that you can again to get it in that neutral position. so it's not sitting
down like this it's nice and tucked and then you're going to come and bring the
part up around your ankles. so you want it to be pretty firm but you want to be
able to easily slide two fingers underneath because you don't want it to
be so tight that you're cutting off all circulation, but you want it to be pretty
firm. so then you're getting that compression you need to get that
swelling out of there. and a lot of times that compression just feels really nice.
it's just like a hug. I usually like to do the inside strap first because that
just helps hold up the arch, and you're gonna cross it over. so you're making
that cross pattern and then you're gonna take the other one and cross it the
other way. so then it gives you that a little bit of a support right there
through the ankles. so again it's not necessarily a brace, it's not stopping
the movement. you don't really want to stop the movement unless you've gone to
your doctor and they want you in something that's actually stopping it
because movement is gonna help with a sprain. you don't want to completely not
move it unless you've got a really big sprain like a grade three or something
and your doctor has told you not to mobilize it at all. but see again this
works really well because it gives you that support that you need but then it
also just kind of helps with that compression to get that swelling out of
there. so if you're interested in purchasing the wrap or anything else
from brace ability, make sure and click on the link up there. so I'm gonna go
ahead and take this off to do the rest of my stuff. a lot of times people do ask
that I wear the wrap or should I wear the brace while I'm doing the exercises.
I personally, if you're doing therapy type exercises, I would say no. if it's if
it's not increasing the pain while you're doing it, you want your muscles to
really try and do the work. if you're wearing that wrap, maybe if you're doing
something a little more high level, you know maybe trying to bike or run or
something like that, that's when you have the wrap on there
or just in general to get that swelling out of there. but if you're doing your
therapeutic exercises, if you can I would do it without them.
so the next one is just an ankle pump. so it's kind of just like it sounds. so
you're pushing down as far as you can and then coming
up as far as you can. so the same thing, I like to have something underneath just
so I have that movement. ankle pumps are great you can do them with your foot out
in front of you you can do them lying down. you can even do them sitting in a
chair which is nice because if you're at work or something, and you're sitting or
you're standing a lot of times that swelling just follows gravity, and it
hangs out by the ankle. but an ankle pump works really nicely to make your calf
muscle almost like a natural pump. that's why I call it ankle pumps to pump that
irritation, that fluid, that swelling back out into your body. so it gets out of
your system and it doesn't just pool up at your ankle. so generally you can do
you know ten reps, two sets of ten, but you can really do these all throughout
the day. again if it's not irritating it then you can do it several times
throughout the day. you don't have to just have to go oh I'm just doing you
know one or two times a day. so then the next one is an ankle eversion and
inversion movement. and a lot of times if you have this ankle sprain it's on the
outside or the inside. so this one might be a little bit more uncomfortable. so
again just work in your pain-free motion. it's just like the circles where you
want your leg to stay still. you want all the movement to be at your ankle. so I'm
just gonna turn it out and then come back in. so sometimes people call these
windshield wipers where you're just kind of sweeping back and forth like a
windshield wiper, but we call it inversion going this way, and eversion
going that way. or you can say you know windshield wipers, but you're not doing
this. the whole legs not moving. you're really trying to get that movement
mostly at the ankle. again to keep it from scarring up to start getting some
movement in there getting that swelling and irritation out of there. so then the
next one is just really kind of I'm gonna I'm going to switch to this side
so you can do see what I'm doing. so this one would be my ankle sprain now it's
just to kind of stretch out the bottom of the foot. a lot of times when you have
an ankle sprain, everything gets tightened up here because you're not
moving your ankle how you're supposed to. so sometimes like plantar fasciitis
tries to creep in a little bit. so just taking your toes and stretching them up
like this. so you're kind of doing this movement with your
hands and then you can just kind of pull at your heel too. so you're kind of
pulling up into that dorsiflexion motion with your toes to help stretch out the
bottom of your foot because again if you're getting swelling and irritation
at your ankle, the whole foots going to be involved. so you really want to kind
of stretch this whole area out as well. and so again it's nice to kind of do you
can do a full 30 second hold stretching it out. or if that's a little bit too
much you know just do a 10 to 15. so if you're doing 10 to 15 seconds, do it
about five times kind of getting it stretched out moving the whole thing but
if you're doing that full 30 second hold you can just do that three times several
times throughout the day. and then once you really kind of have everything
stretched out, if you want to do some really gentle strengthening maybe with
like a resistive band you can. be very careful about this depending on again
how recent your sprain is what grade your sprain is. you really probably want
to talk to your doctor or physical therapist first to progress how you
should because if you go and start doing too much, you're just going to make it
worse. so I like the resistive bands putting a little bit of a loop on it
just to kind of help get the movement make sure you know your colors. different
colors or different resistances that for this particular one this is kind of the
second one up, but you always want to start with the lightest one. so just make
sure you're checking whatever kind of brand of a band that you have. so again
you want to put it around the ball of your foot because if it's up on your
toes you might come back and smack you, and if it's down at your arch you're
really not going to get quite as much. if you don't have shoes on, sometimes I do
like to kind of spread the band out just so it doesn't slide as much. and so all
you're gonna do this is kind of like the ankle pump except now you'd have the
resistance. so now you're just going to push down and see how it rolled just a
little bit, so sometimes if you've just got your socks on you might have to you
know put it a little bit above the ball of your foot as well. so just kind of
check it out and if you need to do this with your shoes on you can do it with
your shoes on as well. but just pushing down but the key is when you come back
up, don't just let it bounce back up. you want to control the band don't let the
band control you. but try and go slow and controlled. so if your foot's doing like
this when you come up. it's wiggling, you probably have too much
resistance. so either don't put as much tension on there, or just try and do them
again the ankle pumps without the resistive band, or if you're higher up
make sure then you go down to a less resistant band. so again you can kind of
start off with you know ten, tens a good number to start with, but if you're
getting to five and then it starts doing this,
don't try and push for it because that means those muscles are fatigued and then
you don't want to over do it. so there you have it those are my seven ways to
treat an ankle sprain. Isn't that good Miss B's? and if you'd like to help support my
channel make sure and click on the link up there.
oh oh and don't forget to subscribe by clicking down there. and remember be safe,
have fun, and I hope you feel better soon.