Hip Flexor Strain Stretches & Exercises - Ask doctor jo

Hip Flexor Strain Stretches & Exercises: ****** These Hip Flexor exercises and stretches can help if you have a strain or pain in your hip flexors. To see Doctor Jo's detailed blog post about this video, visit ****** Related Videos: Hip Flexor Stretches: ****** Hip Stretches to Relieve Hip and Knee Pain: ****** =========================================== **Click Below to SUBSCRIBE for More Videos: ****** ======================================= Doctor Jo is a licensed Physical Therapist and Doctor of Physical Therapy. ****** Facebook: ****** Twitter: ****** ======================================= More details about this video: Start off standing, and get next to something sturdy you can hold onto for balance. This will stretch your hip flexor and your quad. Grab the ankle of the side you want to stretch and pull it behind you. If you don’t have enough flexibility to grab it, you can use a belt or strap to pull it up towards you. Try to keep your upper body vertical, and don’t lean forward. If you lean forward, you won’t feel the stretch. Also make sure your thigh is either even with the other side or slightly behind the other side to get the full stretch. Pull your leg backwards and up until you feel a stretch. Hold this for 30 seconds and do it three times. Next is a hip flexor stretch in a lunge position. First start in a kneeling position. Place the knee of the hip flexor you want to stretch on the ground, and take the opposite leg and bend it in front of you at a ninety-degree angle. You might want to place a pillow under your knee to protect it. You will be in a lunge position with the knee of your injured side on the ground. Now drive the knee of the uninjured side forward away from your body. Hold for 30 seconds, and do this 3 times. If you want to stretch the groin as well, take the good side, and put it out at a 45 degree angle away from your body, then lunge towards that angle. Now for the strengthening, lie down on your back. Bend the knee up on the good side for support. Then simply slide the bad side up and down, keeping your foot on the ground. If that is easy, you can do a straight leg raise (SLR). You want to squeeze your muscles tight to lock out the knee and pull your toes towards your head to keep the whole leg straight. This will work your hip flexor muscles when you lift your leg off the ground. Use slow controlled movements to make sure you are using the muscles and not momentum. Start off with ten, and work your way up. Finally, you can do resistive exercises standing up. Using a resistive band, wrap it around something sturdy. Wrap the band around either leg. You will do the exercises on both legs. The leg that has the band on it is working dynamically or with movement. The other leg is working statically to keep you stable. You will keep your leg straight and try not to bend your knee. Turn away from where the band is anchored, it kick forward. You don’t have to kick high, just keep it controlled with your knee locked out. Hip Flexor Strain Stretches & Exercises: ****** DISCLAIMER: This video and any related comments are not medical advice. Doctor Jo is a licensed Physical Therapist and Doctor of Physical Therapy; however, she is not YOUR Physical Therapist and can't possibly diagnose you through the Internet. So don't use this information to avoid going to your own healthcare professional or to replace the advice they have given you. This information is only intended to show you the correct technique for physical therapy exercises and should not be used to self-diagnose or self-treat any medical condition. If you are not properly diagnosed, this information won't help, and it could make things worse. So seriously, check with your healthcare professional before doing these techniques. If you experience any pain or difficulty while doing these exercises, stop immediately and see your healthcare professional.

Hey everybody, it's Doctor Jo. Today I'm gonna show you some stretches and strengthening exercises for a hip flexor strain. Let's get started. So the first stretch is gonna be a combination between you hip flexors and your quad. You can use something sturdy to hold on to and if you have enough balance just standing, bring your leg back and grab onto your ankle. Make sure your body is in an upright vertical position because it you're leaning forward, you're taking away from the stretch. So just make sure this top part is actually going back and not going forward. So almost push back into your hand so your foot goes out. So you're getting a stretch in your quad and your hip flexors. Holding it there for 30 seconds, and repeat that 3 times. So the next stretch, you want to get almost into a lunge position. The hip flexor that you want to stretch, that leg is gonna be down on the ground. If you only have a hard surface, you might want to put something under your knee so it doesn't get a lot of pressure on it. But usually carpet is ok. Put your other leg out in front of you at about a 90 degree angle. Keep your whole body in an upright position, and keep your upper body in a vertical position. So again if you lean forward, then you're taking the stretch out of it. So just go forward, keeping your body upright, and you'll feel the stretch right through there in that hip flexor. Hold that there for 30 seconds and then come back and do that 3 times. Now if you want to get a little bit on the inside, you can move your leg out a little bit and go at a 45 degree angle the other way, and that will still kind of get the stretch of the hip flexor and a little bit more inside in the groin area. Holding that for 30 seconds and doing it 3 times. So to start off with the strengthening, you can do a simple heel slide. Bringing your heel all the way down, and then pulling it back up. Nice and controlled. Pull it as hard as you can and going back down. Again just starting off with about 10 of these, working your way up to 15 - 20 doing 2 - 3 sets. This might be really easy for some people, so if this is easy, then you can put your leg all the way out, and lock out that knee pulling your toes up, and do a straight leg raise. Just bring it up to about equal to the other side and control it coming back down. So don't let gravity just drop it down, but control it the whole time. Going up and down. Starting off with 10, working your way up from there. If this becomes too easy, then you can do some standing exercises with resistive bands. To strengthen your hip flexor muscle, you can use a resistive band. Make sure you tie it on to something tight so it's not gonna snap off and hit you. Just put it around your ankle, and step out to where it's tight so you can get some resistance. You want to keep your leg as straight as you can. Lock out that knee, pull up your toes a little bit to help lock out the knee, and just bring your leg forward. It doesn't have to be high, you just have to get that work in there. Some people might need to hold on to something, if you need to hold on to something, that's fine, but eventually you want to be able to do this without holding on. Bailey's even so excited to see it. So those were some stretches and strengthening exercises for a hip flexor strain. If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section. If you'd like to check out some other videos, go to AskDoctorJo.com. Don't forget to follow me on Facebook and Twitter, and remember, be safe, have fun, and I hope you feel better soon!