Therapeutic Exercises for Improving Balance and Coordination

Improving balance increases coordination and strength, letting you move freely and steadily. Enhancing stability, mobility, and flexibility allows you to perform everyday tasks easier. It also improves your athletic performance. Focusing on your dynamic balance helps you focus and clear your mind.

Therapeutic exercises for balance improve your core muscles, lower back, and legs. Lower-body strength-training exercises can also help improve balance. Some training exercises are performed with equipment such as a stability ball or a resistance band.

From older adults looking to prevent falls to athletes training for their next big game, balance exercises can benefit people of all ages and fitness levels.

Learn about therapeutic exercises and how they can improve your balance, coordination, and overall well-being. Take control of your health and try therapeutic exercises today.

Tandem Equilibrium

This is one of the few simple balance exercises, yet it is surprisingly effective. Walk in a straight line, heel to toe. Before switching foot positions, hold for around 30 seconds. This is a safe approach to start balancing activities by “walking.” It stimulates the weight-shifting that occurs when you move around regularly. Practice every day for 2-3 minutes.

Standing Marches

Standing marches exercise strengthens muscles and joints. In a standing position, place your legs hip-width apart for this exercise. Raise one knee to the highest point possible, then slowly lower afterward—complete 20 marches in total, alternating legs each time.

Weight Shifting

Weight-shifting is a self-explanatory workout in which you transfer your weight to one side and hold it there for a few seconds. This is still a vital fundamental balance exercise, as it will help you maintain good posture and center of gravity while your body fluctuates. Begin by shifting your body weight to one side slowly. You’ll eventually raise the opposite foot off the ground. Hold this posture for up to 30 seconds and return to your starting position until your foot touches the ground and shift your weight again to the opposite leg.

Stand on your toes

This drill is known by various names, including “heel raises” and “calf raises,” and it’s another simple balance exercise. Start by holding on to the back of a chair for balance and stand straight. Then, push up on all your toes, like standing on tippy toes to reach a top shelf. Be sure not to lean forward but keep your body straight. Before descending, hold for a few seconds—repeat 10–15 times.

Stand on One Leg

The single-leg stance is a good starting stability movement. Stand and maintain a single-leg balance and elevate one foot to around the calf level. Hold this posture for 10 seconds, then move to the other leg and repeat 10-15 times. Always make sure you perform these drills next to a wall or stable furniture that you can hold on to in case you start to lose your balance.

Benefits of Therapeutic Exercise for Balance

Therapeutic exercises are simple and are performed to regain balance. They have several benefits that help the affected person recover quicker and resume normal activities. These are some of the benefits of therapeutic balance training exercises.

Improve Muscle Strength

Improving endurance and muscle strength is important for maintaining good balance and stability, as well as bone and joint health. These exercises improve your balance and strengthen muscle tissues while lowering the risk of injury.

Increase Range of Motion and Flexibility

These exercises are designed to increase the range of motion in your joints and soft tissues. This can be accomplished through active, passive, or assisted stretching. They are intended to assist your joints in moving more freely and painlessly.

Improve Posture and Body Alignment

Even if you aren’t aware of it, your posture directly impacts your muscle power, coordination, and risk of serious injury. Working at a desk for long periods, leaning over keyboards, having low muscle tone, and poor posture patterns can all lead to pain or injury.

Posture exercises alleviate aches and pains by improving posture, making daily tasks easier and more enjoyable.

Increase Balance and Coordination

You put your muscles and skeletal structures to the test every time you get up, walk, rest, brush your teeth, or prepare a meal. If you have poor balance, you lose your ability to easily manage daily tasks!

If you don’t have control over your body, you risk falling and injuring yourself. That is why exercises to improve balance and coordination are critical, especially after an injury or illness.

Reduce the Risk of Falls and Injuries

With improved balance and balance skills, you drastically reduce the risk of falling and, in turn, extend your quality of life.

Implied in balance therapy is the reduction of potential injury, threatening and non-threatening. Better balance can keep you from hurting yourself on icy sidewalks, falling while running up and down the basketball court, or losing balance when picking up trash from the floor.

Improve Mobility and Functional Independence

Those affected by balance problems tend to have impaired mobility and movement skills, and this can be corrected by balance exercises. A series of balance training exercises help regain the patient's movement and mobility skills (and confidence!) gradually over time.

Increase Bone Density and Help Prevent Osteoporosis

Reduce your chances of falling by building muscle strength and improving your balance. Therapeutic exercises can also slow the rate of bone loss, increasing bone density which reduces the risk of fractures from osteoporosis.

Improve Muscle and Joint Function

Therapeutic balance exercises utilize some form of strength training to improve muscles and joint function, which can help stabilize the balance of the patient.

Causes of Balance Issues

Balance issues are caused by one or more of the following conditions and must be tended to immediately.

• Weakness in muscles
• Inner ear problems
• Stiffness in joints
• Depression and high blood pressure medications
• Sedentary lifestyle
• Aging
• Stroke
• Parkinson’s disease
• Multiple sclerosis
• Brain injury
• Arthritis
• Spinal cord injury
• Diabetes
• Cognitive diseases

Balance issues also occur when the following systems malfunction in the body's systems.

• Ocular system
• Ophthalmic system
• Muscular system
• Awareness of one’s own body’s position, also known as Proprioception

Call Your Physical Therapist at Palm Wellness Center Today!

If you want to recover from the loss of body function or you want to improve your flexibility or stamina, then Palm Wellness Center is the place for you.

Our physical therapist will guide you through the proper and safe rehabilitation program.

Schedule your appointment today at (813) 443-5370 or visit our website at www.palmwellness.center.