Ankle Injury From Soccer

Question

Recently I went down in my soccer game and I was told by the ER that I strained my upper superior ligament, or something of the sort. It's been a week and two days, and today was my first day even remotely being able to walk..What should I do to increase my strength in my ankle and get back to playing as fast as possible?

Answer 1

Ligament strain in your ankle? You're now past a week so most of the swelling should have gone away. My advice is to go see a physiotherapist. They will help you out by:

• giving you good advice about when you can start exercise and how much
• using an ultrasound machine to gently heat the tissue to speed healing
• taping you just enough to replace the support of the sprained ligament but reducing the taping over time to encourage the ligament and surrounding tissue to come back stronger.
• giving you exercises to help strengthen things up (I would expect some Theraband exercises and some standing on one foot - progressing to doing that with your eyes shut and waggling all other arms and leg.)

The typical healing time for a sprain is 3 weeks - you're not even half way.

It's important to let it heal properly or it will either be too loose (and sprain again) or too tight and cause you flexibility and pain problems.

You've got a whole lifetime to enjoy your ankle. Getting back to your sport a week or two earlier pales in comparison with that.