Dr. Thomas Dipaolo, DPT

Physical therapy performed properly is completely safe if you are pregnant.

Yes. An experienced PT will know to treat your hip and your back. It is common to have back pain with pregnancy and to have hip pain caused by a back problem. Your PT should be able to figure out which direction to move in to help you feel better relatively quickly.

Continue to work on remaining flexible throughout your entire body. Also, incorporate exercises like planks, squats, lunges and resistive exercises that move through diagonal planes of space.

Your father needs to incorporate physical therapy type exercise/activity for a few hours throughout the day, everyday. Unfortunately, unless you are able to pay out of pocket for this, you will be likely be limited by insurance to a couple days of treatment per week for 2-3 months max.

If your dad cannot leave the house, you can start with a home PT. If he can leave the house, I would recommend a private practice that is not so busy that they cannot spend some quality time working with your dad vs a large corporate chain PT saying, "Here are some exercises. Do them while I go treat someone else. I'll be back in 5 minutes."

Ultimately though, his recovery will depend his desire and ability and on you and any family and friends that can help him perform exercises for a few hours every day. PT treatments a few times a week, which come to an end, are usually not enough. You will need to take the initiative and learn how to help him recover.

You should make an appointment with a PT and be prepared to dedicate a few hours a week with your PT in order to prevent that injury from getting worse. Your PT should be able to diagnose your movement impairment and work with you to restore muscular balance in your shoulder, as well as provide manual treatments and modalities to help ease your pain.

Knee "cracking" is generally an indication of a muscle imbalance in either the hip, knee or ankle. Scheduling a few visits with a physical therapist for a few weeks would be beneficial and likely will get those knees back on track.

Torticollis is generally treated with modalities for pain, stretching and strengthening exercises and postural education. Try to find a physical therapist that believes in manual therapy. Besides general massage, there are neuromuscular techniques that can be utilized by a skilled PT that should give you lasting relief.

Pain is very subjective, so I can't really say. However, generally your first appointment is pretty easy going. You will likely be taken through your available range of motion, testing your end range, and given pretty easy exercises. I doubt there will be much pain. Prepare yourself by taking your medication as prescribed by your doctor and being ready to put the work in to get yourself better.

Absolutely. Physical therapy treatments will help rid the area of inflammation, helping to speed up the healing process. The exercises that are prescribed will also help strengthen weak areas stretch areas that are too tight.

Attempting conservative PT first is a much better option than surgical intervention. It's all relative to the extent of the tear, but many times, you can recover from a rotator cuff tear with a few months of therapy. If PT works, great...you saved yourself many months of pain and rehab, which is what you can usually expect after having surgery. Also, you saved your insurance company tens of thousands of dollars.

If PT doesn't work initially, then you just spent 4-8 weeks strengthening your shoulder, preparing it for recovery. If you went into surgery weak and flabby, you'd have a much tougher time recovering properly.

Physical Therapists are musculoskeletal movement specialists. They are the most qualified to analyze how you are moving and walking and will be able to figure out why you're in pain. It's possible that despite your activity levels, you've created a muscle imbalance or developed an overuse injury. Either way, a physical therapist can treat your issue naturally, without drugs.