Principles of Exercise Therapy.

Remedial exercises have long been recognized as the basis of functional recovery in fractures and other injuries of the locomotor system. In fact, the success of any accident service depends very largely on its organization for the application of therapeutic exercise to all cases and at all stages. In nearly all prolonged or serious illness, however, both medical and surgical, and non-traumatic as well as traumatic, there is a general deterioration of the locomotor system, and this is the chief cause of incapacity during the convalescent stage. In the past, convalescence from these conditions has been entirely negative andloosely supervised, but efforts are now being made by the Ministry of Health to substitute a more positive approach on the lines of the after-care organization in accident services. This, it is hoped, will be brought about by the more extended use of therapeutic exercise, on both a prophylactic and a curative basis. It should be a relatively easy proposition if the right type of organization can be evolved, because it is well known that deterioration of the locomotor system through simple disuse or toxaemia is much easier to cure than the same deterioration following trauma.