Walked into our clinic and spotted someone in what looks like… space gear? Yep, you’re in the right place. These are our NormaTec Hyperice compression garments (not space suits), and they’re changing the way our patients recover in the best way possible.

This active compression technology could be just what you need to recover quicker and optimise your performance. Want to know what a session with these garments could do for you and your training? Read on.

 

Compression: The Benefits To You

 

Let’s dive straight into the benefits. Studies have shown that using these garments can help relieve muscle pain and aches, temporarily increase circulation and hence flexibility and the range of motion available in the joints, help with injury prevention, and accelerate recovery times.

These benefits aren’t all too surprising – after all, athletes and those partaking in recreational sports have used at-home compression garments for decades to help with things like swelling, circulation and repair. This active compression system, however, goes far beyond your at-home compression sleeves – and we’ve explained how below.

 

• Decreases muscle fatigue after exercise
• Promotes circulation, increasing blood flow
• Accelerates healing and recovery
• Reduces swelling and inflammation 
• Prevents delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS)
• Improve athletic performance
• Increases flexibility and range of motion
• Removes exercise-related wastes, like lactic acid 

 

What these benefits mean is that you feel better and perform better at your next workout, you don’t have those evening/next morning aches and pains, your downtime from injuries is reduced and you can prevent injuries before they start.

 

Want to know more about the effects of compression on your circulation and how it can help with spider veins and reducing the swelling in your feet and legs? Click here.

 

How Does Compression Work?

 

The scientific focus of compression is on your blood flow. Promoting circulation means your body is encouraged to remove the waste products left behind, or newly created, as a result of the exercise you just did. It also fuels the cells in your body, bringing them oxygen and nutrients for optimum function. 

In the case of these compression garments, they use air compression to mimic the muscle pump of the legs, using a massage pattern that employs three key techniques to maximise the benefits to you – pulsing, distal release, and gradients. This means that your legs and muscles are squeezed in sections and in intervals to best mimic natural blood flow, maximising circulation and efficiently moving fluids into, and metabolites (waste products), out of the body. 

• Pulsing compression – mimics the way muscles pump blood in the legs
• Distal release – every part of the leg has the optimum rest time possible because the system has released pressure at the right time
• Gradients – create a pressure wave that moves your fluids in your legs in the right direction

The devices we use were created by a doctor-bioengineer, and their exact effects have been proven by a list of clinical studies.

 

Can’t I Just Put On Some Compression Stockings?

 

You could, but you won’t get the same results. Compression sleeves squeeze the area to help keep blood out, and swelling down. Removing the garment means that blood will come rushing back into the area. These garments we have pulse and release in sections, imitating healthy blood flow to the area and keeping the benefits rolling.  

 

What Does A Compression Session Look Like?

 

Compression sessions have become popular here at Sole Motion post-workout, and you can use them pre-workout, too. 

On your end, it’s an easy process where you sit back and relax. We start by suiting you up in the appropriate areas – commonly your legs or other extensions if you need them. We then program the right function to achieve your goals – it could be a recovery flush, a rehab pump, or something custom we program for you. 

 

We then focus the garment on whichever areas will help you the most – this is where we can get very specific, choosing to focus intensely on the foot/ankle, calf, knee, lower quads, upper quads and more. We can also remove areas, or ‘zones’, too. We select your intensity – which we can adjust session by session to help you get the best results. Your compression session lasts between 10 and 60 minutes, and you lie back and let the machine do its thing.

 

This therapy is painless – and our patients love it.

 

Ready To Optimise Your Recovery?

 

Great! Our team of experienced podiatrists are here to help you feel and perform better using these innovative compression garments. Book an appointment online by clicking here, or call us on 1300 FX FEET