物理治療在競技運動表現之角色

The Role of Physical Therapy in Sports Performance

運動物理治療師泛指在運動領域工作的物理治療師，其工作從早期的協助運動員處理傷害與復健，以儘速回到運動場；逐漸演變為積極地定期檢測運動員的關節狀況與功能，並修正其所不足；到今日的協助教練、為運動員評估並規劃個人化的高科技訓練，在競技運動的傷害預防或動作技能強化上扮演極為重要的角色。本文以實證研究為基礎，從各項高階運動物理治療技術的發展歷程，來探討21世紀物理治療師在競技運動領域所扮演的角色。由於許多高階技術缺乏實證研究佐證，因此如何將高階物理治療技術標準化、並設計正確的實證研究方法，探討運動傷害預防與運動表現強化的各項物理治療技術，以客觀方式深入探究，為當務之急。

Sports physical therapists refer to the physical therapists who work for athletes. The role of a sports physical therapist changed with the advance of innovated technology. In earlier years, they managed sports injuries and prescribed rehabilitation program in order to return to sport earlier for an injured athlete. Later, a sport injury prevention program is essential for the sports physical therapist to prevent injures by monitoring athletes’ strength, flexibility, and joint position and function. Today, in addition to the above two concepts, a sports physical therapist must join the athlete training program and provide advanced-level skills to assist training. The purpose of this review is to elaborate the role of sport physical therapy in the 21^(st) century based on evidenced-based research. Since the evidence of some advanced skills are not strong enough, future studies should focus on how to standardize procedure of those advanced skills and conduct an appropriate research trials.