What Exactly Is Shockwave Therapy and How Can It Help You?

 Are you struggling with slow healing injuries that limit your movement and hinder your everyday life? Have you been saddled with a physical condition that leaves you in chronic or acute pain? If you answered yes, you’ve probably tried several treatments to alleviate these issues. If you’re still looking for the right solution, shockwave therapy may be the next option for you.

At Reform, we are proud to offer the latest next-generation shockwave therapy technology. When combined with our skilled and highly trained practitioners, it has continuously led to successful results. 

However, what is shockwave therapy, and how can it help to treat your physical issues? Keep reading to find out about this highly effective therapeutic procedure. 

What is Shockwave Therapy?

Extracorporeal Shockwave Therapy (ESWT), also known as shockwave, is a modern highly effective treatment method that was originally developed to treat kidney stones in the 1980s. Over decades, this technology has been transferred to various other uses in sports medicine, physiotherapy, orthopedics, and veterinary medicine.

By and large, its most popular use is to enhance the body’s natural healing processes, helping to speed up recovery—in particular, injuries such as broken bones and injured ligaments and tendons. It’s also used to treat chronic pain and help restore mobility after injury.

Shockwave therapy is a soundwave-based technology that is completely non-surgical and non-invasive, with no need for painkillers during or after the procedure. It uses acoustic pressure waves directly on the injured area of a person during treatment. The shockwave is a physical sound wave “shock”, not an electric one.

How Does It Work?

Shockwave therapy works by converting radial pressure waves into low-energy acoustic waves that can be transmitted into the musculoskeletal tissue and other affected areas. These acoustic waves can be carried through tissue by applying a “contact” gel to the skin, which helps to facilitate a more effective transmission.

These “shockwaves” create what we would call “microtraumas” in the musculoskeletal tissue. These microtraumas are harmless, but they will trigger the natural healing processes of your bones, tendons, and other soft tissues. This is how treatment can help to accelerate the healing of injuries. 

The applied shockwaves also work to break down scar tissue and calcification in injured tissue. These issues can be a serious setback to the normal function of bone, joints, and tissues. By breaking them down, shockwave therapy can help restore mobility in the injured area. 

Shockwave percussion also affects the nerves in the affected area, limiting the pain signals that are transmitted to the brain. As a result, chronic or acute pain can be reduced significantly.

What are the Benefits?

This procedure has a wide range of benefits that make it an appealing process for many people. It stimulates the metabolic response in an injured area, prompting the affected tissue to repair itself far more quickly than it would otherwise. 

As a result of these processes and the others mentioned above, patients who are treated with shockwave therapy will often report accelerated healing, noticeable reduction in pain, and increased mobility in the affected area. 

Shockwave therapy can be used to treat conditions such as plantar fasciitis in the tendons, tennis and golfer's elbow, chronic tendinopathy , shin splints, heel spurs, hip pain, myofascial pain syndrome, shoulder pain, and more. 

Due to the added benefits of this technology, many choose shockwave over other forms of pain and injury treatment. These benefits include:



Non-surgical: Shockwave therapy is entirely non-invasive and non-surgical, meaning little downtime is required after the treatment. It also requires no anesthesia or pain-relief treatment before or after the session.

Comparatively low cost: Compared to the wide variety of treatments you might normally seek out to treat your physical conditions, shockwave therapy is very cost-effective. 

Normally three to five sessions are necessary at weekly intervals; there is a small possibility that 2 or more additional treatments may be necessary if your condition is very chronic.

Fewer side effects: There are only a few recorded side effects of this procedure. You may experience mild swelling or soreness, which should subside in the first few days following treatment. 

Get in Touch Today!

Shockwave therapy has been shown to improve the physical conditions of around 80–90% of patients who undergo therapy. It’s even more effective when used alongside other physical therapy treatments. 

If you think shockwave therapy might be the right option for you, get in touch with our team at Reform Clinics , a multi-disciplinary clinic in Oakville, Ontario. We are a physical therapy and rehabilitation centre that focuses on promoting health and wellness in our patients, with professional physiotherapy and chiropractic treatments that lead to effective results.

Call us today at 905-827-5757 or fill in our contact form to book your first consultation.

We also offer Complimentary Consultations for those who are unsure on how they may benefit from shockwave therapy or have any questions.