Ways To Safeguard Self From The Treadmill Injuries!

“Unless you fell off the treadmill and smacked your face, no one wants to hear about your workout!” You must have come across this quote. Well, a lot of people prefer treadmill exercises for building their strength, a healthier body, and a fit mind. However treadmills are considered to be the riskiest workout machines because of the serious injuries they cause. In this current article we will discuss on the treadmill injuries and talk about how to safeguard self from the serious injuries in treadmill.

How about taking a look on the statistics related to treadmill exercises and the injuries or death caused due to it? Check them out below:

• It has been recorded that there were 30 deaths on report linked with the use of treadmill from the year 2003 to 2013 in America, that makes approximately 3 deaths a year and which is also very few when compared to the death compared to those died when struck with lightning
• Though death related to treadmills are rare, injuries are far more common. It has been reported that in the year 2014, there were about 24,400 injuries associated with treadmills, while 62,700 injuries were reported for all the exercising equipments
• There are also reports about 10,808 injuries were estimated to occur in 2010 among the age group below four years of age. It means treadmill injuries are also common among children.

You must be wondering about the statistics showing kids treadmill injuries. Let us look on it in a more concise manner. As per the data provided by the US consumer product safety commission, more than 8,700 children are injured by exercise equipment every year and treadmill being one of the major causes.

Here is what you can do to prevent kids from encountering treadmill injuries.

• Make sure your kids do not play on or near the treadmill equipment.
• Make the children learn everyday that treadmills are not toys rather are the fast-moving equipments which can cause danger.
• Locate or make use of any auto—shutoff features that may exist in your treadmill workout equipment
• Make barriers that would prevent your children wandering in the room with treadmill or other exercise equipments.

Below are some of the possible injuries seen with treadmill exercises:

• Majority of the serious accidents or injuries from treadmill exercises involves excruciating friction burns. These are so much devastating that the victim may require expensive skin grafts and a comprehensive rehabilitation for healing. It must be checked that the treadmill is not placed too much close to the wall or any other exercise equipment, else the person exercising may get trapped and the moving belt of the treadmill can grind away at the skin exposed to it.
• Treadmill Injury Resulting in Contusion: There are also risks of meeting with contusions, where the injured blood capillaries are ruptured and require serious treatments.
• Treadmill Injury Resulting in Laceration: There are also injuries of lacerations seen with treadmill exercises when not done with proper presence of mind.
• Treadmill Injury Resulting in Foot or Joint Problems: Foot pain including the joint, heels and ankle pain occurs sometimes due to treadmill exercises.
• Strained muscles and shin splints are common injuries in treadmill exercises.
• Sometimes people with heart diseases meet with sudden death while exercising on treadmill. So, heart issues might be seen with workout machines like treadmill. One must clearly check the heart condition before trying on treadmills to avoid risks.

“Safety is the cheapest and most effective insurance policy”. Isn’t it really true? So, here we are with some of the most effective ways to safeguard self from serious injuries in treadmill exercises:

• Maintain Your Natural Posture to Prevent Treadmill Injury: It is highly important to keep a note on the posture while exercising on treadmill. Maintain your natural posture and keep safe from treadmill injuries.
• Workout on Treadmill According To Your Body to Prevent Injuries Related To Treadmill: Mostly it happens that beginners to treadmill exercises are excessively curious to see the results in their weight reduction from the workout. However, it must be kept in mind not to over strain your body and go for the workout with your body’s capacity. It is good to start slow and gradually increase the speed in the treadmill, i.e. only up to 15% of increase in the speed every week. This way you can prevent injuries like strained muscle and shin splints occurring from treadmill exercises.
• Check for Proper Fitting Shoes to Prevent Treadmill Injury Related to Improper Footwear: There is a saying, “Good shoes take you to good places”. So you must keep a note to check for the proper fitting shoes, the shoes which are new and not worn out, shoes that are designed for running and the shoes that can absorb shock well. They may be expensive but they surely are good investments for great workout and they save you from serious injuries while working out with treadmill.
• Keep a Note on the Incline: You must check the incline in treadmill. Usually the exercisers meet with ankle pain and injuries while walking uphill in the treadmill. It must be noted that you are providing the best support to your ankle so as to keep safe from treadmill injuries while exercising.
• Minimize the impact: If you are working out on a treadmill, make sure that your strides are quick and short. Make sure you are lifting your feet so as to minimize the force of impact transferred to their legs by the moving belt of the treadmill.
• Warm up and Cool down to Prevent Treadmill Injuries: Cool muscles do lack with flexibility and lack the flow of blood into it. So it is needed to warm up before you start performing on the treadmill. Start with slow walking over it for 5- 10 minutes and then go for static stretches and range of motion exercises. Now, once you are done with your treadmill exercises make sure you are cooling the muscles down. In order to do these, go for slow walking over the treadmill for the final 10% of the total time spent in the equipment. Then do series of leg stretches along with the hip stretches so as to prevent from injuries due to treadmill workouts.

“Accidents will happen sometimes no matter how careful a man may be”. Have you ever noticed this? It happens sometimes that even after our safety precautions we meet with some unexpected accidents or injuries at times. So, what to do when you meet with any of the treadmill injury or accident so as to prevent self from any such similar accidents or ensure that you do not meet with such accidents in future? Here is what we have in the list below.

• Make a detailed report on your incident. Starting from how you fell, what speed and height settings you used in the treadmill while the accident, if you were wearing the auto-stop device etc.
• Also check if you were with the right fitting shoes while treadmill accident which occurred, if you were being guided by someone or you were doing alone on your own without following the proper guidelines or instructions
• Make a check if the treadmill was placed at the correct location. If not, then relocate it to a safer area where it does not touch the wall or any other exercising equipments etc.

By maintaining a record on all these and clearly observing them all, you can ensure self from not facing with the similar injuries over treadmill.

“Everyone is after a fit and fine body, because that is what we all earn”. It is good to keep us fit and healthy for life and treadmill workouts are beneficial in it. However it is also important to check that while doing this we are not creating more of troubles and pains to selves. So, maintain safety, take essential steps for proper workouts and enjoy the wonderful benefits to your health and life. Take guidance from a professional fitness trainer, keep in touch with your doctor for having a check at your health condition and treat you with the best of treadmill exercises.

“You deserve to have a body, you feel proud about!”

Also Read:

• Why do We Feel Strange after Getting off a Treadmill?
• Elliptical Vs Treadmill: Differences Worth Knowing
• What is a Treadmill Stress Test?
• What Does TMT Test Indicate?