Shoulder Injury Prevention

The shoulder is one of the most amazing joints in the body. In fact it is not a 'joint', but rather a 'complex' of 5 joints, over 30 muscles and 6 major ligaments. The shoulder can assume no less than 1,600 different positions! There is more movement at the shoulder joint than at any other joint in the body. As such, it is easily prone to overuse and injury. Shoulder injuries can often be prevented, by following simple guidelines. 

• Stay in good overall physical shape. Strengthen your wrist, arm, shoulder, neck, and back muscles to help protect and decrease stress on your shoulder. Do stretching and range-of-motion (ROM) exercises for your arms and shoulders.
• Maintain good posture. Stand straight and relaxed, without slumping.
• Warm up well and stretch before any activity. Stretch after exercise to keep hot muscles from shortening and cramping.
• Wear protective gear during sports or recreational activities, such as roller-skating or soccer.
• Wear your seat belt when in a motor vehicle.
• Do not use alcohol or other drugs before participating in sports or when operating a motor vehicle or other equipment.
• Don't carry objects that are too heavy. Make sure children and teenagers use school bags and backpacks correctly.
• Avoid catching falling objects.
• Use a step stool. Do not stand on chairs or other unsteady objects.
• Use the correct body movements or positions during activities, such as lifting, so that you do not strain your shoulder. Do not lift objects that are too heavy for you.
• Avoid overusing your arm doing repeated movements that can injure your bursa or tendons. In daily routines or hobbies, think about the activities in which you make repeated arm movements. Try alternating hands during activities such as gardening, cooking, or playing musical instruments. Use rest, ice, compression, elevate (RICE) for home treatment.
• Avoid keeping your arms out to the side or raised overhead for long periods of time, such as when painting a ceiling. If you must do these things, take frequent breaks, and use RICE for home treatment.
• Consider consulting a sports-training specialist if you are a competitive or serious recreational athlete. The specialist can recommend training and conditioning programs to prevent shoulder problems or injuries.
• Make sure your child's backpack is the right size with good support. Carrying heavy backpacks may increase the risk of shoulder problems or injury.
• If you feel that activities at your workplace are causing pain or soreness from overuse, call your human resources department for information on alternative ways of doing your job or to discuss equipment modifications or other job assignments.

Cody Carlson CPT, Gold's Gyms of Wenatchee Valley

Reference: Webmd.com

Cilantro Lime Chicken

Skillet Chicken with Creamy Cilantro Lime Sauce

Yield: serves 4

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 40 minutes

Print Recipe

One skillet and 40 minutes is all it takes to transform chicken into a flavor-packed meal!

Ingredients:

• 4 skinless boneless chicken breasts
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 1 cup chicken broth (I recommend reduced sodium)
• 1 Tablespoon fresh lime juice (I use closer to 1.5 Tbsp)
• 1/4 cup finely chopped onion
• 1 Tablespoon chopped cilantro
• 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes¹
• 3 Tablespoons heavy cream²
• 2 Tablespoons unsalted butter, cubed
• optional: lime wedges and more cilantro for garnish, steamed asparagus for serving

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F (190°C).
2. If the chicken breasts are uneven in thickness, pound them down so they're all even. This way all the breasts will cook through similtaneously. Sprinkle each with salt and pepper.
3. In a large ovenproof skillet, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add the chicken and cook for 6-7 minutes, turning once. You want the chicken nice and browned on the outside. (It doesn't have to be cooked all the way through yet.) Set chicken on a plate and cover tightly with foil until step 5.
4. Remove skillet from heat and add the broth, lime juice, onion, cilantro, and red pepper. Return to heat. Cook and stir to scrape up the browned bits from the bottom of the skillet. Bring to a boil. Allow to boil gently, uncovered, for 10 minutes or until the liquid is reduced to around 1/4 cup. (During this time you can steam some veggies to have on the side, like asparagus.) Reduce heat to medium-low, then add the cream and butter. Stir until butter has melted.
5. Add chicken to the sauce and place the skillet in the preheated oven. Bake uncovered until the chicken is completely cooked through, about 5-10 minutes.
6. Serve chicken with sauce spooned on top and any of the listed optional garnishes. Leftovers keep well in the refrigerator for a few days. Reheat to your liking.

Additional Notes:

1. Adjust the amount of red pepper flakes to your liking. This amount made the chicken mildly spicy. The cream in the sauce mellows out the spice.
2. You can use whole milk instead, but for the thickest, richest sauce I highly recommend heavy cream. If using whole milk, make sure it is at room temperature to help prevent curdling.

Understanding the Calf and Shin to Prevent Injury

Your calves and shins may not have the complex construction or delicate reputation of your knees and feet. But that doesn't mean they're indestructible. In a recent survey of 14,000 injured runners, sports podiatrist Stephen M. Pribut found that calf pulls were the second most common complaint, with shinsplints coming in fourth. These injuries outranked Achilles tendinitis, heel pain, even lower-back pain. 

Why are they so common? Anyone who runs on hard surfaces, trains in worn-out shoes, rapidly jacks up mileage, or neglects stretching and strengthening the lower leg is at risk, says Pribut, who treats runners in Washington, D.C. 

Calves

To keep your lower legs healthy, it helps to understand how they work. Your calves lift the heel about 1,500 times per mile, and your shins support the arch, raise the toes, and absorb impact. Because the propulsive motion of running works the rear of the leg more so than the front, muscle imbalances are common among runners. 

You've probably heard this about your hamstrings and quadriceps, and the same is true with your calves and shins. As a result, runners typically have overworked, tight calf muscles and weak shin muscles. This can lead to four specific lower-leg injuries—calf pulls, shinsplints, stress fractures, and compartment syndrome. 

A calf pull (also called a strain or tear) occurs when one of the calf muscles (gastrocnemius or soleus) is stretched beyond its limits and separates from the Achilles tendon. When it occurs, you may hear or feel a pop in your calf muscle. 

Not warming up enough, doing too much hill work, stretching excessively, and suddenly increasing your mileage can lead to calf strains. Recovery depends on the severity: minor microtears may heal in two weeks. A complete tearing could take up to four months. 

Shins

Pain down the front of your lower leg is likely due to shinsplints—or medial tibial stress syndrome, as medical practitioners prefer to call it. It's thought of as a beginner's injury, but shinsplints can strike anyone, especially those who overtrain. They're caused by degeneration of the muscles or tissues that attach to the tibia (shinbone). 

Anterior shinsplints affect the tibialis anterior muscle (outer side of the tibia), which keeps your toes from dragging when you take a step and lowers the forefoot to the ground. Posterior shinsplints indicate irritation of the posterior tibialis muscle (inner side of the tibia), which decelerates the pronation of the foot after heel-strike. 

Too many miles with too little rest, improper biomechanics, or tightness and weakness in the calf muscles are all contributing factors, says Janet Hamilton, a registered clinical exercise physiologist and author of Running Strong and Injury Free. 

Typically, this pain strikes when you start to run and stops once you've warmed up. If you have shinsplints, the best remedies are rest, icing, stretching and strengthening exercises, and anti-inflammatories.

If the pain is persistent, however, it could be a stress fracture. "The tibia takes about 70 percent of your body weight during running, which means it's under a lot of pressure," says Brian Krabak, M.D., a sports-medicine and rehabilitation specialist at Johns Hopkins University. Stress fractures—or small cracks on the surface of bones—rarely occur from one sudden trauma, but more commonly from the accumulation of damage. 

The definitive test for a stress fracture is a bone scan or an MRI, but a touch test often gives it away. "You can usually find one spot on the tibia that makes you jump off the table," says Pierre Rouzier, M.D., team physician for the University of Massachusetts and author of Sports Medicine Patient Adviser. 

Of the shin injuries, stress fractures demand the strictest rehab: usually six to eight weeks of rest. Some research has shown that using anti-inflammatories can interfere with bone mineralization and prolong recovery, making it important to diagnose a stress fracture early—anti-inflammatories are a typical treatment of other lower-leg injuries.

Exercise-induced compartment syndrome can also cause lower-leg pain. The repetitive nature of running can lead to swelling within the lower leg's compartments, which house its muscles, tendons, and nerves. "When you run for a long period of time, a compartment can get too much blood, causing it to swell, and essentially choke off blood vessels to the nerves in the foot," says Dr. Rouzier. 

Damaging those nerves can make your feet feel numb and clumsy, like you're shuffling, not running. Symptoms generally disappear within an hour after you stop running but recur when exercise resumes. Rest usually alleviates the problem. In severe cases, surgery may be necessary.

Luckily, Dr. Krabak says, most issues can be dealt with by looking at your training and your biomechanics to determine how to approach the problem. After all, while a bag of frozen peas might help ease the pain, you won't prevent re-injury unless you find and fix the underlying cause.

Ted Spiker - Runner's World

Tomato Avocado Salad

Tomato Avocado Salad

1lb. Roma Tomatoes 

1 English Cucumber

1/2 Red Onion, sliced

2 Avocados, diced

2 T. Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Juice of 1 lemon

1/2 Bunch Cilantro, chopped

Salt and Pepper to taste

- Gently mix all ingredients except salt. Add salt right before serving.

-- 

Dana Lowe

Certified Fascial Stretch Therapist

ACE Certified Personal Trainer

Golds Gyms of the Wenatchee Valley

509.663.4965 (Wenatchee)

danal@goldsgymwen.com