Stability
Stability
What is Stability?
Stability is the joints ability to maintain control of movement or position by co-ordinating actions in the surrounding muscles ligaments and bones. For the ankle this is most noticeable in our ability to balance
Balance
To have good balance you need 3 system working in sync. These 3 systems are your vestibular system (inner ear), vision and your proprioception (joint awareness).
Often when we suffer an injury our proprioception system can be affected. This can be directly, the injured tissue and the tiny nerves inside the tissue get injured affecting their ability to send messages to our brain or indirectly through the wearing of braces and supports meaning this system gets lazy and switches off.
Proprioception is important because this system tells our brain where are joints are without looking at them. The more accurate this system is the less likely we are to suffer injuries.
Your stability or balance will be affected due to pain swelling and the soft tissue damage
Try the progression test below, if you pass it move straight onto Stage 2 – Stability
If you are unsuccessful try the following exercises and then retry the progression test every few days until successful
Rehab
At this stage try these simple stability exercises :
If you found those exercises too difficulty try this as an alternative and progress back to the above when you start to feel more stable:
If you found those exercises too easy here are some progressions to try and push you onto the next stage of recovery:
Once you feel you are managing to complete the exercises with ease, complete the progression test below to see if you are ready to move onto Stability Stage 2!
Lesson Content