Taping your ankles prior to sport or while you recover for injury can help to keep your ankles safe, but there are more benefits than meet the eye when it comes to taping. In today’s blog, we shine a light on three benefits of ankle taping and talk about when ankle taping may be right for your feet.
How Ankle Taping Helps
Here’s a look at three reasons why someone may consider taping one or both of their ankles prior to activity.
1. Injury Prevention – Ankle taping can help to provide support to our ankle joint and the supportive ligaments during athletic activity. If you know that you are going to be making quick movements or running on an uneven surface, you may want to give your ankles a little more durability and support. It’s pretty common to see football players (especially linemen whose feet move, plant and twist in close quarters with one another) with their ankles taped for an extra layer of injury protection.
2. Post-Injury Stability – Along a similar vein, some people like to tape their ankles while they are working their way back from an injury. Again, taping can help to provide extra stabilization, which is especially important if you’re working your way back from an ankle sprain or ankle instability. Any extra help you can provide your recovering ankle ligaments will help keep your ankle stable. Not only is ankle taping great at preventing injuries in healthy athletes, but it also helps to keep recovering athletes from suffering a setback.
3. Swelling Reduction – Kenisio taping is a type of taping that helps to take stress off an injured area by encouraging lymphatic flow. Swelling and bruising in an area is common after acute trauma, but this response by your body can slow down the healing process. Your lymph system carries white blood cells to an injury site while also clearing waste and dead cells from an area, so by taping in a certain manner to improve lymphatic flow, the swelling can drain and healing can run its course sooner.
To learn more about the benefits of ankle taping, or to talk to a specialist who can walk you through some taping techniques, reach out to Dr. Silverman and the team at Silverman Ankle & Foot today.
