Alcohol And Injury Recovery Don’t Mix

If you want to stay on track with your recovery, stay off the booze! While we’ll do everything we can to treat you at our Kingsland physio clinic, there are certain key things you can do to assist, and avoiding alcohol is one of the biggest.

Professional football codes including rugby union, rugby league and football typically have very strict protocols around this. As soon as a player is injured, they have to stay off alcohol for the duration of their recovery. The reason is simple – these clubs pay big dollars for their star players and they want them back on the field as soon as possible. An alcohol-free recovery programme will speed that up. While the vast majority of us are not professional athletes, we should take a note out of their book because the principle is the same. Alcohol and injury recovery just don’t mix.

As an example, even a small amount of alcohol is enough to increase bleeding and swelling around injured soft tissue. One reason for this is that the alcohol thins the blood; blood flows faster to the injured site, flooding the area and increasing both the swelling and amount of toxins that will linger around the injured area. The swelling and toxic build-up will impede healing to a significant degree, and promote the growth of scar tissue underneath the skin’s surface. This  often means even more rehab is required and a longer wait to get fully mobile again.

That is one very important reasons why you need to stay clear of alcohol as part of your injury recovery, but it is not the only one. Alcohol can also have a masking effect when it comes to pain, and give you the impression that you’re physically capable of doing something you’re not. And the empty calories in alcohol can lead to a fairly significant weight gain if your injury reduces your ability to exercise for any length of time.

If you want to get over your injury as quickly as possible, we suggest you contact us for the best possible treatment at our clinic, stick to the at-home recovery we devise for you – and resist the temptation to enjoy a drink or two. We don’t want to be party poopers, but when you overcome your injury right on schedule, you’ll be grateful you took our advice.