Therapeutic Exercise

Excerpt

In the simplest terms, therapeutic exercise involves movement prescribed to correct impairments, restore muscular and skeletal function and/or maintain a state of well-being. The many benefits of exercise are too numerous to count in any one article, though therapeutic exercise involves a cavalcade of benefits for the restoration of function, quality of life, and overall health. Many people exist at a bare minimum of physical ability in terms of their daily lives and need only a minor illness to reduce function significantly. Exercise as a therapeutic approach involves repeated, regular activity in different modalities to increase a person's resistance to illness and length of recovery after such an illness. This article will explore important aspects of therapeutic exercise as pertaining to clinicians for the maintenance of health.

The goals of rehabilitation are to restore function in the setting that further deterioration is unlikely, but there are also benefits when deterioration is inevitable (such as in the palliative care setting). The primary modalities used for rehabilitation are physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech and swallowing therapy, all of which are performed by specialists in their fields.