How Balance Therapy Can Improve Your Balance, Strength, and Coordination
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), falls are the leading cause of injury for adults 65 and over. With the right balance therapy program, however, you can improve your balance, strength, and coordination to lower your risk of falling.
Here’s a closer look at what balance therapy is, what exercises can help you the most, and how FYZICAL can help support your journey to improved physical health.
What is balance therapy?
Balance therapy uses specific exercises to help stabilize your body, keep you upright, and lower your risk of falling. More specifically, these exercises help you process information quicker, and react quicker with improved reflexes and strength to keep yourself stable.
Many patients just associate balance problems with not being able to stand or walk well. While that is true to an extent, balance can involve far more than just walking or standing. It can involve your eyes, inner ear, and cognitive abilities.
This makes balance therapy an umbrella term for different types of therapy programs. These programs can include:
- Gait training and balance programs
- Fall prevention and balance retraining
- Fitness and wellness programs
- Vestibular rehabilitation therapy (VRT)
- Functional training
Who can benefit from balance therapy?
Anyone can benefit from it if their physical therapy evaluation finds it necessary. It has helped everyone from athletes to those who have had a stroke and those with Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis (MS), cognitive diseases, and amputations.
However, older adults often benefit from it the most. That’s because nearly 80% of adults over 70 have been diagnosed with “abnormal” balance.
You can benefit from a customized balance program treatment plan if you:
- Have fallen in the last year
- Use or have been advised to use a cane or walker
- Sometimes lose your balance when you walk
- Worry about falling
- Use your arms to push yourself out of a chair
- Have trouble stepping up onto a curb
- Sway when you’re standing still
- Take short, narrow steps
- Often stumble or look at the ground when you walk
- Often rush to the restroom
- Have lost some feeling in one or both of your feet
- Get light headed or sleepy from taking your medications
Balance therapy exercises
Your physical therapist will help you do different exercises based on your treatment plan. Here are some common exercises that can help strengthen your muscles, improve your balance, and keep you upright.
Single-limb stance
Using either a chair, bar, or another sturdy object for support, stand upright and flat footed with one hand (or both hands) on the object. Then lift one foot off the ground, and keep it lifted for however long you can.
Put that foot back down, and repeat the exercise with the other foot. Try repeating this up to five times. Also, try to count how long you kept each foot lifted. This will help you measure your progress and even boost your confidence as you keep each foot lifted longer.
Lateral stepping
Stand with your feet together and with one hand (or both) on a sturdy object. Step to one side about a shoulder-width distance while the other foot stays planted and while you’re holding on to the object for support.
Bring your extended leg back in for your feet to be together again. Then repeat this exercise with the other leg. Do as many lateral steps with each leg as you can. This exercise helps most with balance and side-to-side coordination.
Wobble board exercise
A wobble board is a circular wooden or plastic board with a rounded, sphere-shaped bottom. Standing on this board gives you an unsteady surface that improves your balance, leg and core strength, and visual sense of stability.
Try to stay balanced on the board for 30 seconds to a minute. Everyone from older adults to athletes use this exercise, because it engages so many parts of your body. Remember to use it on a flat surface with your physical therapist’s help.
Ready to request an appointment?
Don’t let balance keep you from living your healthiest, most confident life. Contact FYZICAL Therapy & Balance Centers today at (501) 733-3037 for more information, or submit this form to request an appointment.