Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation

What is Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation?

Physical medicine and rehabilitation, also known as physiatry, is a specialty with the primary goal of helping patients with motor disabilities regain functional capacity and movement. Its approach is multidisciplinary, as the disability may arise from a brain, nervous system, musculoskeletal, or spinal cord condition, and treatments must be adapted to each person’s abilities and needs.

What Does Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Study?

Due to the complexity of its field, it is essential that experts in physiatry specialize in its different areas of application. This differentiation allows the provision of personalized treatment for patients. The most prominent sub-specialties of physical medicine and rehabilitation are:

• Rehabilitation: in this consultation, the patient's condition is assessed, an action plan is outlined, and treatment objectives are set. Once the therapy is defined, the patient is referred to the appropriate area.
• Sports Rehabilitation: tailored to the needs and demands of athletes, who require faster recovery times.
• Physiotherapy: focuses on a combined approach using techniques to meet defined objectives. It is common to apply electrotherapy, therapeutic exercises, and assisted manual therapy.
• Hospital Physiotherapy: aimed at hospitalized patients who need to improve their physical condition. This area covers post-surgical respiratory physiotherapy, physical recovery for long-term patients, and musculoskeletal physiotherapy after traumatic surgeries.
• Traffic Accident Physiotherapy: specialized in the rehabilitation needs of patients who have suffered an accident.

Who is it Aimed At?

This specialty is directed toward patients of any age with physical disabilities, regardless of the cause, whether it be a disease, accident, or surgical intervention.

Techniques, Procedures, and Diagnostic Methods

As expected, many and varied techniques are used in physical medicine and rehabilitation. Physiotherapy methods are the most common, although not the only ones:

• Lymphatic Drainage: a physiotherapy technique that involves a massage to mobilize liquids and facilitate their elimination. It achieves a draining, analgesic, and healing effect.
• Neurological Physiotherapy: its goal is to improve mobility in patients with injuries caused by alterations in the central nervous system.
• Therapeutic Massages: mobilize tissues to relieve tension, stimulate muscles, and reduce pain.
• Dry Needling: a technique for treating muscle pain that stimulates the nervous system and relieves pain.
• Occupational Therapy: promotes physical activity so that patients can maintain, as much as possible, the rhythm of their daily lives.
• Myofascial Therapy: a technique that reduces pain and improves mobility in patients with dysfunctions affecting the myofascial system, which is the tissue that surrounds muscles, bones, organs, arteries, and nerves.