Therapeutic Exercise and Activities

The main goal of Therapeutic Exercise is to improve or maintain functional ability, including daily living skills, through the application of careful and gradual forces to the body. Often, this overall goal is achieved through the objectives of developing, improving, restoring or maintaining one or more of the following: strength, endurance, flexibility, stability, coordination and/or balance.

• Strength Training - strength in muscular tissues is improved through graded and deliberate overloading of the targeted muscle(s).


• Endurance Training - endurance affords individuals the ability to perform activities over a relatively prolonged period. With total body endurance, an individual developes the ability to participate from a low-intensity conditioning to a high-intensity conditioning.


• Flexibility Training - contractile and noncontractile tissues both are susceptible to tightening when injured or exposed to a neurological disease process that causes weakening and/or spasticity. Prevention, through careful and regular movements and stretching, is key to maintaining flexibility.


• Stabilization - stability is required in order to provide a stable base for functioning.


• Coordination and Balance Training - the ability to execute patterns of movement with the right timing and sequencing is essential to motor function, as is the ability to maintain one's center of gravity.


• Gait Training - a person's gait is a pattern of stepping or walking that is specific to that individual. Gait Training is needed to help a specific patient gain proficient and safe ambulation. Patients usually require gait training if there is some lower trunk or lower limb dysfunction.