Physiological Strategies to Enhance Performance Flashcards
What is Hydrotherapy?
Hydrotherapy involves the use of water as part of a post-event recovery process
What is Contrast Water Therapy?
- Contrast water therapy involves the alternating submersion of the body into hot and cold water.
- Is based on the premise that the alternating of hot and cold water elicits a vasodilation then vasoconstriction effect on the blood vessels, acting as a ‘muscle pump’ and promoting blood flow to the muscles.
What are the benefits of Contrast Water Therapy?
- Increased removal of waste products from the working muscles
- Increased supply of oxygen and nutrients to the working muscle
- Decreased inflammation and oedema (swelling)
- Increased circulation
- Increased range of motion
- Decreased likelihood and severity of DOMS.
What is Cryotherapy?
Cryotherapy is the therapeutic use of cold to cool the body. It involves the vasoconstriction of blood vessels to reduce blood flow.
What are the benefits of Cryotherapy?
- Decrease acute inflammation from muscle damage
- Reduce the perception of pain and discomfort
(providing an analgesic effect) - Decrease blood flow
- Decrease tissue temperature and core temperature, therefore decreasing sweating and lessening the impact of dehydration
What is Thermotherapy?
Thermotherapy or heat as a recovery modality is more often associated with soft-tissue injury, where it usually applied 72 hours AFTER cryotherapy.
What are the benefits of Thermotherapy?
- The application of heat facilitates an increased blood flow. This will increase the delivery of oxygen-rich
blood and nutrients to the muscles, while also increasing the removal of waste products. - Decrease muscle spasm and stiffness
- Increase muscle elasticity and joint range of motion
- Increase neural transmission
What are the potentially harmful effects of Thermotherapy?
- Caution needs to be exercised when using thermotherapy, as it can increase core body temperature. This may be an unfavourable outcome immediately after exercise, particularly in hot environments where the general goal is to reduce elevated body core temperature.
- Heat also increases the inflammatory response and should be avoided immediately after sustaining a soft tissue injury
What are Pool/Beach Sessions?
These sessions make use of general water immersion and are popular in team sports such as AFL and NRL.
What are the benefits of Pool/Beach Sessions?
Immersion in water causes an inward and upward displacement of body fluid towards the centre of the body, resulting in a compressive effect caused by hydrostatic pressure. In recovery terms, this is simply a form of compression.
This compressive effect assists recovery by:
- Reducing muscle oedema (which can compress
localised capillaries, reducing oxygen delivery
and enabling greater cellular damage to occur)
- Increasing blood flow, and therefore increasing
the delivery of oxygen and nutrients and removal
of waste products.
What are the benefits of Compression Garments?
Compression garments help to:
• increase blood flow and therefore improve the delivery of oxygen
and nutrients and removal of waste products
- reduce perception of pain/soreness.
- reduce venous pooling.
- reduce swelling
- reduce the severity of DOMS.
What is Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy?
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) is the name of the treatment associated with a hyperbaric chamber. Hyperbaric chambers are pressurised with pure (100 per cent) oxygen.
What are the benefits of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy?
Under this pressure, a much larger amount of oxygen is dissolved into the blood, primarily through an increased uptake by the blood plasma (which usually transports negligible amounts of oxygen).
Therefore, the use of HBOT will:
• increase the speed of recovery, including injury
• reduce swelling and oedema
• stimulate new blood vessel growth
• shorten the inflammatory response process
• help prevent infection
What are the benefits of Massage?
- increasing blood flow, therefore increasing the delivery of oxygen and nutrients and removal of waste products
- decreasing muscle tension
- increasing the sense of wellbeing
- decreasing the perception of fatigue
- increasing the range of joint motion
- decreasing muscle stiffness
- decreasing anxiety
- reducing the impact of DOMS.
- decreasing muscle oedema
What are the benefits of Sleep?
Anecdotally, sleep is regarded as the best recovery strategy available to performers. It is during sleep that the body can begin its repair and adaptation process.
