Whether you injure your ACL playing sports or from a fall at work, you need to know all you can about to make the best decisions about your injury. This short guide will hopefully help you.

Torn ACL: 4 Things You Should Know

When it comes to sports injuries, an ACL tear can be one of the worst one injury you can get to your knee. But it really depends on the severity. Here are four quick facts you should know about a torn ACL that can help you determine such questions as “How bad is the injury?”

7 Self-Administring Tests to Know If You’ve Injured Your ACL

Anterior cruciate ligament. ACL for short. It’s the ligament that runs up from your shin bone and passes through the middle of the knee, attaching itself to the bony part of the femur, or thigh bone. It’s not very big. Less than an inch and a half long and half an inch wide.

Can You Return to Top Performance After ACL Surgery?

The world of sports is full of miracles. This so-called miracle usually involves the underdog upsetting the favorite in an improbable comeback, but most of the time when the word “miracle” is used to describe some aspect of sports, it’s sensational, exaggerated and flat-out overblown until now.

Football Players: How to Prevent ACL Injuries

A torn ACL (Anterior Cruciate Ligament) is arguably the worst injury a football player could suffer. It usually ends the player’s season and can even put their careers in jeopardy.  Even after surgery, the chances are slim that a player can reach prior levels of performance.

What Hockey Players Should Know about ACL Tears

Hockey is not as brutal on the body as football, where full contact is possible on every down, but due to the high-speed collisions on a rink, a hockey player can find himself suffering from a serious knee injury like an ACL tear.

What Is a Successful ACL Reconstruction Surgery?

Minnesota Vikings Pro Bowl running back Adrian Peterson suffered a season-ending injury in his game with the Washington Redskins last Saturday. Fortunately for him and the Vikings, who weren’t in playoff contention to begin with, there is only one game left in the season.

Dr. Rick Lehman is a distinguished orthopedic surgeon in St. Louis, Missouri and an articular cartilage reconstruction pioneer. He owns U. S. Sports Medicine in Kirkwood, MO, and LehmanHealth. Learn more about Dr. Rick.

Dr. Lehman – Cracking Your Knuckles

Is Yoga bad for you? This centuries old practice is coming under fire. Some critics say it’s dangerous and could cause injuries. Orthopedic Surgeion Dr. Richard Lehman from the U.S. Center for Sports Medicine in Kirkwood talks about the growing controversy.

Brady threw for 50 touchdowns that year and the team was on the path to completing a perfect season: 19-0. But those sacks and the pressure put on Brady disrupted his rhythm enough so so that he threw only one touchdown in that game, ending the night at 29 of 46 for 266 yards.

This year it may be different. Brady is a quick passer with two great tight ends that seem always to be open up the middle. Dumping it off to them for quick gains could be enough to make the Giants defense honest and spread the field.

Lots not forget Wes Welker.

Wes Welker is a wide receiver who can play like a tight end–except really fast. That’s what makes him such a versatile threat.

These three players–Welker, Grankowski and Hernandez–make for great quick targets. Throw in the fact that the ageing offensive Matt Light needs help, Brady ended up throwing nearly 3,000 yards on throws under 10 yards.

The Giants, on the other hand, have Justin Tuck and two-year standout Jason Pierre-Paul. Tuck recorded two of those touchdowns from four years ago and Pierre-Paul is a beast to stop. He’s easily one of the best defensive players in the playoffs so far.

And he’s healthy. So is Tuck. But there are some defensive players who are not as healthy. Here’s the injury report the Giants released today.

• David Baas C Abdomen - Limited participation in practice (LP)
• Chase Blackburn LB Calf - LP
• Will Blackmon CB Knee -  Did not participate in practice (DNP)
• Ahmad Bradshaw RB Foot -  LP
• Hakeem Nicks WR Shoulder -  DNP
• Umenyiora, Osi DE Ankle/Knee - LP
• Corey Webster CB Hamstring - DNP
• Jacquian Williams LB Foot - DNP

If the pressure isn’t put on Brady, then the New York Giants secondary has to hold up and cover the Patriots wide receivers if they want to win the game. Then again, if they can’t, Eli Manning needs to be prepared for a shootout. That’s means Nicks and Ahmad need to be healthy. Even if they aren’t fully, Victor Cruz may end up being the MVP.

Dr. Rick Lehman is a distinguished orthopedic surgeon in St. Louis, Missouri and an articular cartilage reconstruction pioneer. He owns U. S. Sports Medicine in Kirkwood, MO, and LehmanHealth. Learn more about Dr. Rick.

The age ranges from 10 to 19, with most of those injuries occurring while playing hockey. Total hospital visits were around 600 for boys in that age range. Close to 700 injuries were suffered while snow skiing or snowboarding.

For the children under 10, most made trips to the hospitals because of injuries sustained snowboarding, skiing or tobogganing. Adults between the ages of 20 and 49 made the most trips to the hospital due to injuries sustained while snowboarding.

As you might imagine, falls on ice were the most common forms of injury. There were a total of 47 falls a day in 2011–a total of 7,138–which was the most of the winter activities. Roughly half of those falls were suffered by people over 60. And women suffered 56% of all winter falls.

What’s interesting is hockey does not suffer the most injuries. That distinction goes to skiing and snowboarding. Injuries sustained participating in these sports was twice as high. Snowboarder Sarah Burke died today after rupturing her vertebral artery during an accident she sustained in Salt Lake City on January 10. She was a British Columbian freestyle skier and Winter X Game gold medalist, figured to win a gold in the 2014 Winter Games.

The moral of the story is to be careful when you hit the slopes. It’s dangerous out there.

Dr. Rick Lehman is a distinguished orthopedic surgeon in St. Louis, Missouri and an articular cartilage reconstruction pioneer. He owns U. S. Sports Medicine in Kirkwood, MO, and LehmanHealth. Learn more about Dr. Rick.

So what should you do in the case of an accident like a fall and you have an aching back injury? Here’s some advice.

Wear the Right Snow Boots

Snow boots maybe large and clumsy to wear and track in a lot of mud and snow, but they are superior when it comes to keeping traction as you walk. This is so important for anyone who is out shopping or going to work. You usually have to walk across a parking lot to get where you are going. The danger there is with the black ice–ice patches that are hard to see against the black pavement.

Wearing snow boots will give you better traction for your feet than dress shoes or tennis shoes, preventing you from falling.

Shorten Your Stride

When walking try to take shorter steps. This is especially important for anyone who is tall and typically has a longer stride. Putting too  much distance from your feet can force pressure on your feet at an angle that is like causing it to slide. Instead, take shorter steps and plant your entire foot down at the same time, not your heel first. And never run.

What to Do If You Fall

If you do fall on the ice and feel like you’ve hurt your back, the first thing you should do is try to get up slowly. Get up on all fours, hands and knees, being careful not to slip again as you try to stand. Keep you hand on some kind of stable object, like a rail or a car.

A fall on the ice can lead to a deep muscle strain in your back. Once you get to a safe place, say your desk or couch, try to do some light stretching and take it easy for a few hours. It may be helpful to take some ibuprofen or Tylenol for those who are cleared to take it.

Put Ice on the Injury

When you are resting put some ice on the injury for the next 48 hours, or until the swelling and inflammation goes down. Ice always relieves pain better than heat. Apply a heat pack after a few days if your back doesn’t feel any better. Avoid using electric heating pads since these devices can lead to burns. Instead, use a pad you heat in the microwave. A simple home remedy is to get a sock, fill it with rice and tie it off. That heats up well and holds heat. Never leave a heating pad on overnight.

When You Should See a Doctor

Deep muscle strains from falls usually don’t require you seeing a doctor. However, if you have a risk of osteoporosis or thinning bones, you might want to see a doctor who can pull some x-rays. This includes trouble breathing, sitting or standing or if you have a shooting pain running down your leg that occurs any time you try to straighten out your knee. This may be caused by a herniated disc, which can get better but usually requires some PT, maybe injections or even surgery.

Recovery Time of Back Injuries

You can expect most back injuries to get better by a few days if not a few weeks if there aren’t any nerve irritation or fractures in the bones, as proven by a medical evaluation.  Stretching and strength exercises are critical to getting back to health.

Dr. Rick Lehman is a distinguished orthopedic surgeon in St. Louis, Missouri and an articular cartilage reconstruction pioneer. He owns U. S. Sports Medicine in Kirkwood, MO, and LehmanHealth. Learn more about Dr. Rick.