Exercise Therapy For Neuropathy

Today's post from portlandtribune.com (see link below) is yet another article promoting exercise therapy as being important for neuropathy patients. It's a message nobody with neuropathy wants to hear but is nevertheless an important one. The key is finding a therapy that is tailored to your own symptoms and for that you need a therapist/doctor/specialist who knows what they're doing and what they're talking about. An ordinary physical therapist is sometimes just not good enough because their general medical knowledge often doesn't take into account the peculiarities of neuropathy and nerve damage. First, you need to accept that exercise will help you; then you need to talk to your doctor and finally you need to do your own research and together with your health professional, develop a course of exercises appropriate to your condition and capabilities. This can be as soft or hard as you wish but doing nothing is a much worse option.

New research shows exercise therapy helps diabetic peripheral neuropathy
Created on Wednesday, 15 October 2014 10:36 | Written by Colin Hoobler |

Focus on Fitness

I’m 54 years old and have had Type 2 diabetes for 10 years, but now it’s worse because I also have pain, numbness and tingling going down my legs. My doctor says this is common in people with diabetes and prescribed medication along with a series of injections, which have helped. But I don’t like the side effects. Can physical therapy help? – Gwen from Vancouver

The answer is yes, but it should be a certain type of physical therapy if you want to address both your leg pain and diabetes, which is the likely cause of your leg pain.

You get Type 2 diabetes from eating a poor diet and inadequate exercise over an extended period. In Type 2 diabetes, your body’s cells aren’t effectively processing insulin, the hormone from your pancreas that controls blood sugar. Consequently, blood sugar is isn’t absorbed from the bloodstream well and remains chronically higher.

The pain, numbness and tingling you’re having is called diabetic peripheral neuropathy, which occurs in about 33 percent of American diabetics over 40 years old and is the result of nerve degeneration. Many people with peripheral neuropathy eventually have problems with walking, maintaining balance and lower leg injury

Extensive research has shown the importance of regular exercise accompanied by a sound diet in managing diabetes. Peripheral neuropathy, however, is another story. Only recently has research shown the importance of exercise therapy for people with diabetic peripheral neuropathy; where those who followed a 10-week supervised endurance and strengthening program yielded dramatic reductions in pain and nerve pain and symptoms, while increasing new nerve growth. This is a big deal, because it offers a new, cost-effective physical therapy that you can use in addition to medication and/or injections to expedite recovery.

Physical therapy can help, but it should be in the form of exercise therapy as opposed to “traditional” methods (e.g., manual therapy, ultrasound, modalities) so you start to address the cause of your diabetes. Many physician and physical therapy offices are recognizing the need for an exercise therapy emphasis in the medical treatment of diabetes and peripheral neuropathy. Health insurance companies (including Medicare) are also recognizing the importance of this medical model, as they are covering physical therapy services for exercise therapy to treat diabetic peripheral neuropathy, back pain, osteoarthritis and many other costly lifestyle-related conditions.

Specifically, your exercise therapy program should help you learn how to exercise safely and effectively on your own with whatever equipment you have available. A skilled physical therapist can show you how to strengthen, stretch and improve endurance of your muscles. Note that your muscles are like “blood sugar sponges;” the stronger they are, the more blood sugar they can absorb and therefore control your blood sugar.

The use of exercise therapy to help treat peripheral neuropathy is relatively new, so you may have to suggest it to your doctor to get the proper physical therapy referral for insurance coverage. Regardless, you have more control over your recovery than previously thought.

Colin Hoobler is a certified physical therapist and writes a regular column

http://portlandtribune.com/nbg/144-features/237048-102974-new-research-shows-exercise-therapy-helps-diabetic-peripheral-neuropathy