Improve surgical outcome with only 8 days of pre-operative BFR strengthening after knee surgery..

Welcome back to this episode which is a short series of paper reviews that highlights the different uses for Blood Flow Restriction around Knee surgery.

Today's episode looks at the positive effect of only 8 days of pre-operative strengthening with respect to density and function of the quadriceps within the first 4 weeks of ACL reconstruction. This is a great concept as it is well documented the outcome from surgery is improved with relative muscle strength and size. With the positive effects of training with BFR whilst using low-loads, this training methodology in a pre-operative state really highlight the advantages of blood flow restriction. This is also something to highlight in some people, where the injury may prevent any kind of meaningful strengthening program prior to the operation due to the inability to strength train through a suitable range and load.

The article for reference is called:

Short–Term Frontiers in physiology, 9, 1150.

Žargi, T., Drobnič, M., Stražar, K., & Kacin, A. (2018).

I hope you are enjoying this mini-series that puts together a collection of different BFR papers of relevance to optimising recovery from knee surgery.

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See you soon for the next episode.

Thanks for listening and remember to keep the pump.

Chris