Discover
Expert Sports Injuries Treatment in Birmingham
You don’t need to be a professional athlete to take your injury seriously. Whether you run three times a week, train at the gym, play Sunday league football or cycle at weekends — when an injury stops you doing what you enjoy, it matters. And it deserves proper clinical attention, not just rest and hope.
At Harborne Chiropractic Clinic, we treat sports injuries across all activity levels and disciplines. Our multi-disciplinary team — combining chiropractic, physiotherapy, sports massage and shockwave therapy — means we can address every layer of a sports injury, from acute tissue damage through to rehabilitation and return to full activity.
Why Sports Injuries Need Proper Treatment
The instinct when injured is often to rest, wait and see. For minor strains this can be appropriate — but for the majority of sports injuries, passive rest alone is not sufficient for full recovery. Without proper treatment, injuries frequently heal with scar tissue, compensatory movement patterns develop, and the underlying biomechanical issues that contributed to the injury in the first place remain unaddressed.
The result is predictable: a return to sport too soon, a re-injury at the same site, or a secondary injury elsewhere as the body continues to compensate around the original problem. The single most important thing you can do after a sports injury is get it properly assessed — so that treatment is directed at what is actually wrong, not just where it hurts.
Discover
Sports Injuries We Treat
Running Injuries
Running places repetitive, high-impact load through the lower limb and spine — making it one of the most common sources of overuse injury we see. We treat the full range of running-related conditions:
- Plantar fasciitis and heel pain
- Achilles tendinopathy
- IT band syndrome and lateral knee pain
- Patellofemoral pain syndrome (runner’s knee)
- Shin splints (medial tibial stress syndrome)
- Hip flexor and glute tendinopathy
- Stress reactions and stress fractures — assessed and appropriately managed
- Low back pain associated with running biomechanics
Gym and Strength Training Injuries
Lifting and resistance training injuries typically involve the spine, shoulders, knees and hips — either through acute overload or the accumulation of repetitive mechanical stress over time. We treat:
- Lower back pain from deadlifts, squats and heavy loading
- Shoulder impingement and rotator cuff strains from pressing movements
- Pec minor and biceps tendon injuries
- Knee pain from squatting and lunging patterns
- Wrist and elbow pain from gripping and pulling movements
- Hip impingement and labral irritation
- Neck pain and upper back strain from poor posture under load
Cycling Injuries
Cycling injuries are predominantly overuse in nature, driven by bike fit issues, training load and the sustained, repetitive positions of road and mountain biking. We commonly treat:
- Knee pain — patellofemoral syndrome, patellar and IT band tendinopathy
- Lower back and hip pain from sustained flexed posture
- Neck and upper back pain from extended riding position
- Piriformis syndrome and saddle-related hip pain
- Achilles and calf issues from pedalling mechanics
- Wrist, hand and shoulder pain from handlebar loading
Recreational and Team Sport Injuries
Acute injuries from football, rugby, tennis, swimming, netball, golf and other recreational sports — including:
- Ankle sprains and ligament injuries
- Hamstring and quad strains
- Groin strains and adductor injuries
- Shoulder dislocations and AC joint injuries
- Tennis elbow and golfer’s elbow
- Knee ligament sprains — including ACL support and post-surgical rehabilitation
- Rib and thoracic injuries from contact sport
- Neck and cervical spine injuries
Discover
How We Assess and Treat Sports Injuries
Every sports injury assessment at Harborne begins with a thorough clinical history — covering how the injury occurred, your training history and load, your goals and timeline, and any relevant background. We then carry out a structured physical examination to establish an accurate diagnosis and identify any contributing factors — movement patterns, biomechanical weaknesses or training errors that increase injury risk.
Treatment is built around three phases:
Phase 1 — Reduce pain and protect the injury
Manual therapy, soft tissue work and targeted treatment to reduce pain, swelling and muscle guarding. Activity modification advice to allow tissue healing without complete deconditioning. For chronic tendon conditions, shockwave therapy is integrated at this stage where appropriate.
Phase 2 — Restore movement and rebuild strength
Progressive rehabilitation to restore full range of movement, rebuild tissue strength and correct the biomechanical contributors to the injury. This phase is the most important and most frequently skipped — pain going away does not mean the injury is ready for full return to sport.
Phase 3 — Return to sport and injury prevention
Sport-specific loading and movement patterns are reintroduced progressively, with clear criteria for each stage of return. We also address the training load, technique and biomechanical factors that contributed to the original injury — so that your return to sport is more resilient than before, not a return to the same risk.
Discover
The Advantage of a Multi-Disciplinary Sports Injury Clinic
Sports injuries rarely involve just one tissue or one system. A running knee injury, for example, may involve the IT band, the patellofemoral joint, the hip abductors and the lumbar spine all contributing simultaneously. Treating only the most painful point rarely produces lasting results.
At Harborne, our chiropractors, physiotherapists and sports massage therapists work together on the same cases. If your injury has a joint component and a soft tissue component and a tendon component — all three can be addressed within the same treatment plan, in the same clinic, without the delays and communication gaps that come with being referred between providers.
