The Link between Knee and Ankle Injuries and Proprioception

Most people take proprioception for granted, even though it is an amazing sense. Proprioception refers to your body’s ability to sense joint movement and position.  

If your eyes are closed and you start slowly extending your leg, you know if your foot is  only a little off the ground, half way up, or at the end of your range of motion. That’s proprioception. The sense is much more finely tuned than most people realise, and even slight deficits or improvements can make a big difference in injury prevention and injury rehabilitation – and maybe even in sports performance.

Combined, two sports training studies from Italy and the USA followed 1,600 semi-professional and amateur football players. Half of the athletes received a supervised proprioceptive training program as part of their warm-up routine while the other half trained as normal. The people who received proprioceptive training programs experienced 85% to 88% fewer ACL injuries (anterior cruciate ligament – the ligament that crisscrosses the knee to provide knee stability and prevent your knee from bending both directions). That’s a very large reduction. Hypothetically, improvements in proprioception improve balance and coordination, which would have athletic performance benefits as well.

 Proprioceptive training is not just for athletes at risk of ACL injuries. At Advanced Physiotherapy and Injury Prevention, we routinely evaluate and rehabilitate proprioception for thorough rehabilitation of many types of leg, foot, and ankle injury. When there is a tear in a ligament or tendon of the leg, foot, or ankle, the nerves involved in proprioception often become damaged. Even when people are feeling better, they may not realise that they now have a proprioceptive deficit setting them up for re-injury.

 Studies have shown us that proprioception can be improved through targeted training and that it can create a dramatic improvement in the chance of future injury.

 At Advanced Physiotherapy & Injury Prevention, it is our philosophy that no leg injury rehab program is complete without an assessment of and specific rehab for proprioception.