Dance-specific, Graded Rehabilitation: Advice, Principles, and Schedule for the General Practitioner

Abstract

Dancers frequently experience lower-extremity injuries which require dance activity restriction, if not full “time off” and/or surgery. Recovering dancers are frequently over-eager to return to dance, but engaging in too high an activity level too soon can be detrimental. Currently, there are no formal guidelines for general physicians about advising injured or postoperative dancer-patients about when or how to return to dance activity. Socioeconomic hurdles further prohibit many dancers from seeking rehabilitative services from a dance physical therapist. Therefore, there is a need for physician education about general dance-rehabilitation principles, as well as access to a dance-specific structured rehabilitation program. We present here rehabilitation advice from an expert in dance orthopedic surgery and an example of a “preventive rehabilitation program” for injured or postoperative dancer-patients with lower-extremity injury.