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You’re having a baby! It’s an exciting time, and now more than ever you have the desire to take the best possible care of your body for you and your baby’s health and well-being.

If you’re planning on adding to your family (or maybe you’ve recently received the happy news that you’re expecting!), you’re probably already envisioning life with a new baby. You may even be thinking about things like childproofing the house and learning about the importance of good nutrition for child development.

Occupational therapy is a type of rehabilitation that uses daily activities to help people of all ages live more independent and productive lives after a medical emergency. As we age, we’re more likely to have an illness, memory loss or injury. That’s why over one-third of occupational therapists work with older adults. In fact, occupational therapists are often advocates for the elderly, working with local community groups and governments to ensure each is doing their part to allow seniors to maintain as much independence as possible.

Getting older often comes with occasional aches or pains. However, nearly 50% of all seniors report suffering from chronic pain — pain that is persistent, lasts for an extended period of time, makes it difficult to perform daily activities, and doesn’t respond to common anti-inflammatory medications such as ibuprofen or naproxen. Many of these instances of chronic pain are often found in the hip, resulting in stiffness, difficulty using stairs, trouble bending down and pain when walking. It’s no wonder then that hip replacement surgery is one of the most common elective surgeries in the United States, performed on more than 300,000 patients each year.

Being able to move with ease and do the things we enjoy is something many of us take for granted. It’s only after we experience mobility issues due to joint pain, arthritis or stiffness that we realize what we’ve lost. But it’s possible to have healthy joints well into your later years if you start taking care of them now.
Cartilage and synovial fluid are found within the joints of our knees, elbows, shoulders, hips and more; they help protect joints and keep bones from rubbing together. But as we age, it’s not uncommon to experience wear and tear or injuries to the cartilage, which can ultimately lead to damaged joints, arthritis and pain.

Do your fingers feel very cold and turn blue when exposed to a drop in temperature? You may be experiencing symptoms of Reynaud’s (pronounced: ray-NOSE) disease, a condition affecting small arteries supplying blood to your skin. People with Reynaud’s react strongly to the cold; their arteries shrink and become narrower, limiting blood flow, and causing their skin to whiten or become blue from lack of blood. Even holding a glass of iced drink can cause this effect. Reynaud’s can occur on its own, for no reason. It can also arise from an underlying cause, such as an injury, certain medications, or a condition such as carpal tunnel syndrome.

While pregnancy is a beautiful time in a woman’s life, the entire process of being pregnant can cause a lot of changes to and stresses on the mother’s body. One of the more extreme examples expectant mothers need to be aware of is preeclampsia.

Preeclampsia is a serious high blood pressure disorder that happens during pregnancy or soon after childbirth. This potentially life-threatening condition affects about 5% of U.S. pregnancies. But with proper care, most pregnant women with preeclampsia have healthy babies and stay healthy themselves.

This blog post will talk about preeclampsia and what can be done about it. It will also discuss a related life-threatening condition known as HELLP syndrome.

A nerve block sounds complicated, but it’s simply an injection to treat or manage several types of pain. It works by injecting a specific medication that blocks the pain receptors of certain nerves — hence the name.

Nerve block injections can be used to create a total loss of feeling during a surgery, but they can also be used for ongoing pain management. Nerve blocks can be used for spinal pain management as well as for pain relief in your arms, legs, neck and buttocks. Nerve block results can vary by patient; pain relief can last days or months.

Surgery is one of the most effective ways to treat joint problems, especially if the mechanics of the joint like the ability to bend your knee have been impacted. Even though surgery might be the best option to treat a joint injury, it’s natural to be apprehensive about going under the knife. The good news is that the traditional way of using large incisions to gain access to a joint is being phased out in sport injury treatments. In this post, we’re going to take a deep dive into the orthopedic trend of arthroscopic procedures and the benefits they have for anyone struggling with a sports injury.

Whether you’re currently expecting or have just given birth to your new bundle of joy, it’s natural to think about growing your family even more. In fact, you might think that having children back to back would have some real benefits for your family. However, it’s important that you have proper “pregnancy spacing” when you’re considering conceiving another baby. In this post, we’re going to take a look at how long you should wait until you get pregnant again and identify the ideal time between pregnancies.