There is plenty of research that shows that as people age, physical strength decreases. This may not appear as much of a problem, but the truth is that physical strength is something you should strive to hold on to for a long as possible.

The good news is that strength doesn’t actually have to decrease as you age. Physical therapy for seniors can help you keep your strength and vitality well into the golden years. That way, you can lead healthy and happy lives at any age.

Physical Therapy for Seniors: Why Do Seniors Need to Improve Strength?

The average life expectancy is about 79 years in the United States. While this can be a blessing, it also means that you need to make an extra effort to keep your body strong as you age.

A study by Duke University found that age-related decline in physical fitness starts when someone reaches their fifties, on average. Functional impairments like losing the ability to bathe oneself, walk upstairs, or get up from a fall, as well as diseases like osteoporosis, have all been linked to a loss of physical fitness as you age.

While it seems inevitable that bones lose density causing you to shrink, muscles lose elasticity causing you to be weak and inflexible. Overall, mobility gets worse as you age – the truth is that these processes can be mitigated with physical activity.

Benefits of Physical Therapy for Seniors

Physical activity helps to maintain bone density, improve endurance, strength, and flexibility, and keep the many different systems of the body functioning normally. Seniors who engage in physical exercise can reduce the risk of many diseases, as well as enjoy a better quality of life. Taking care of your body just makes sense – especially for older people.

Benefits of physical therapy for seniors include:

• Improved Flexibility: Muscles become stiff and tense when they’re not used. Physical therapy can help you improve flexibility and prevent stiffness.
• Balance and Coordination Maintenance: Help prevent falls from happening by keeping the body conditioned and the nervous system firing. By exercising the body and brain with movement, balance and coordination can be maintained.
• Injury Prevention: Despite your best efforts, trips and slips may still happen. The problem is, for seniors, these incidents can become very serious if they do not have a strong enough body to absorb the impact. Physical therapy keeps your body strong.
• Improved endurance: As you age, you may notice that you get tired a lot faster than you used to. By undergoing physical therapy, you’ll be able to keep up with the young ones again!
• Independence & Quality of Life: Overall, a stronger body allows people to stay independent and happy for longer into life. By regularly working out the body, you can ensure that the body functions as it should in daily life – allowing you to travel, work, and play as much as you want.

However, if you are a senior who hasn’t been active for a while, it’s not wise to jump right into physical activity. A physiotherapist can help ease you into it to make sure you don’t hurt yourself.

What to Expect In a Physiotherapy Session for Seniors

If you do decide to get serious about maintaining your physical strength and vitality, it’s a good idea to seek out a physical therapist.

A physiotherapist will help you by:

• Prescribing exercises, such as walking, swimming, and stretching.
• Supervising your sessions to make sure you are performing the exercises correctly.
• Motivating you so that you are always improving.
• Suggesting proper recovery activities.
• Helping to relieve any pain or soreness you may have.
• Answering any questions you may have.

A physical therapist will be able to provide you with a personalized training program to help reach your goals while supervising you every step along the way to make sure you stay safe.

Physical Therapy for Seniors in South Orange, NJ

Ready to get in touch with a physical therapist and start claiming your life back?

The physiotherapists at South Orange Rehabilitation & Wellness offer professional, hands-on one-on-one therapy for plenty of folks who are looking to regain their strength. Best of all, they are experienced in helping seniors gain back their strength and liveliness.

Contact South Orange Rehabilitation & Wellness today to schedule an appointment. Find out what physical therapy can do for you!