One thing we mention to every patient, regardless of their diagnosis, is the importance of completing a home exercise program for physical therapy success to be optimal.
The Home Exercise Program (HEP) is a critical part of the physical therapy process, because it is designed for patients to continue make progress between sessions. Patients who complete their HEP experience accelerated healing and improved outcomes.
In this article, we’ll discuss why we harp on this topic so often, and some tricks you can use in your own life to stay committed to your physical recovery!
What is the HEP in physical therapy?
For those unfamiliar, the “HEP” physical therapy abbreviation stands for “Home Exercise Program.”
A Home Exercise Program is a customized set of strengthening exercises, stretches, and mobility drills prescribed by your physical therapist to be completed at home. These exercises are specifically tailored to the patient’s injury, condition, and goals, addressing areas such as strength, mobility, flexibility, and balance.
Before we discuss the importance of completing your home exercises, let’s answer a few common questions that our patients have for us when we initially bring this up to them:
How often should I do my home exercise program?
The home exercise program is generally recommended to be completed daily. In some cases, we may provide you with a shorter home exercise program and recommend that you complete you home exercises both morning and evening.
How long does a home exercise program take?
We know that your time is valuable, and therefore we try not to prescribe endless exercises. Our goal is that your home exercise program should take under 10 minutes to complete, from start to finish. Often, they don’t even take that long.
Depending on the frequency we recommend, this may mean you have a total commitment of 10-15 minutes per day dedicated to a home exercise program, often split up between a morning and evening session as we described above.
Will a home exercise program be the same for the entire duration of treatment?
No. Generally, the home exercise program will change over time as you become stronger, better balanced, and more mobile. Just like we progress your exercises and modalities in the clinic when you come in for appointments, we want to progress your home exercise program.
What should I do if I miss a day?
If you miss a day or miss a session, we tell patients not to worry about it too much. Simply pick up wherever you left off and begin completing your exercises again the next day. We do NOT recommend “doubling up” on your exercises to make up for a missed day, as this can place excessive strain on your joints over and above our intended goal.
The best advice is to simply pick up the program again as soon as you’re able.
Why the HEP is so important
This is your prescription
The best way to think of a home exercise program in physical therapy is to think of it like a medication that a doctor prescribes to be taken once or twice daily for a given length of time.
In the same way, physical therapists prescribe exercises to be completed at regular intervals at certain times of the day (usually morning or evening). This is viewed as an integral part of the overall treatment plan, rather than an optional piece.
As physical therapy is a holistic approach to physical healing, we are relying on stimulating your body’s natural regenerative systems to heal your joints and build you back stronger!
In other words, if you don’t complete your home exercise program, it would be the same as skipping your prescribed medications from a doctor – inevitably leading to sub-par results.
Continuity of care
We’ve written entire articles on what to do between physical therapy sessions. The punchline: the home exercise program, along with resting effectively between physical therapy days, are very much a part of the treatment process.
The HEP ensures that the work done during in-person sessions is reinforced and sustained. Skipping these exercises can delay recovery or even lead to setbacks.
Improved recovery outcomes
Just as following your primary care provider’s orders between appointments leads to improved outcomes, so does the home exercise program lead to dramatically improved (and faster!) outcomes during a physical therapy course of treatment.
Additionally, we often find that folks who mention that physical therapy didn’t work for them often didn’t complete their home exercise programs, or were inconsistent in other ways.
Patient empowerment
The last thing we’ll mention is that the home exercise program has an effect on patients who complete it that extends beyond the individual course of treatment for their specific injury.
When you complete you home exercise program, you become an active participant in your own recovery. You begin to control your own physical wellbeing in a way that is powerful both physically and emotionally.
Prevention of future injuries and a roadmap for the future
Lastly, you set yourself up for a continued habit of completing exercises day to day that keep you healthy over the long term. Note that we aren’t necessarily talking about a full-blown exercise or workout program here; we’re just talking about taking a few simple steps each day to ensure that you continue to stay healthy and strong long after your physical therapy treatment is over.
Tips and tricks to stay committed to your physical therapy HEP
Staying consistent with a HEP can be challenging, especially as life’s responsibilities pile up. Here are some tips to ensure success:
- Set a Routine: Incorporate your exercises into your daily schedule. Setting a specific time for your routine helps turn it into a habit.
- Track Your Progress: Though this is optional, some patients find that keeping a log or calendar can be helpful for multiple reasons. First, checking each day of completed exercises can be motivating. Additionally, it can help you remember how many days of the program you’ve completed, and which ones you’ve missed when you’re discussing progress with your therapist.
- Stay in Communication: We’ve mentioned the patient-therapist communication dynamic as essential numerous other places on our site, and we do believe it’s extremely important. Any good physical therapist will take your feedback and use it to make adjustments, expediting your progress further.
- Ask for Visual Aids: Many physical therapists provide diagrams or short instructional videos videos to accompany your HEP. If your therapist doesn’t, you can always ask for them. These videos can be helpful in remembering the various cues we have gone over with you in the office.
How often should you do physical therapy exercises at home?
Though the answer to this question will somewhat vary on a case-by-case basis, here are some general guidelines regarding how often you should be completing home exercises:
- Generally, in the beginning, we ask you to complete home exercises once or twice per day. If you’re completing exercises twice per day, morning and evening tend to be a convenient time frame for most people.
- Your therapist will sometimes have you step down to a once per day or every other day schedule after the first few weeks of initial progress has been made.
Regardless of the recommendations above, we encourage our patients to discuss the topic of home exercise frequency with their therapist, as the individual physical therapist working on your case will have a much more in-depth knowledge of your needs.
