How Shockwave Therapy Speeds Up Recovery Faster Than PT Alone
5-minute read
You’re doing all the right things: strength training, mobility work, consistency with your rehab, and yet your pain is still lingering. Maybe it’s your Achilles. Or your shoulder. Or that stubborn glute pain that shows up every time you try to run hills or lift heavy.
Sometimes, the tissue just needs a nudge.
That’s where radial shockwave therapy comes in. At Atomic PT, we use this powerful tool to help stimulate healing in areas that are notoriously slow to recover, especially when traditional physical therapy hits a plateau.
What Is Shockwave Therapy, Exactly?
Despite the intense name, shockwave therapy is a non-invasive treatment that uses sound waves, not electricity, to stimulate blood flow and healing in injured tissue.
More specifically, we use radial extracorporeal shockwave therapy (rESWT). It delivers pulsed acoustic energy into tissue layers that are often too deep to target with hands-on work or foam rolling alone. These sound waves trigger a mild, controlled inflammatory response, which jumpstarts your body’s natural repair mechanisms, essentially telling your cells, “Hey, let’s finish healing this.”
Why Some Injuries Need More Than Exercise
Tendons and other connective tissues don’t have the same rich blood supply that muscles do, so when they’re injured or overloaded, they often stall out in the healing process. You might feel fine at rest, but as soon as you load the tissue again, whether it's running, pushing off, or going overhead, the pain comes right back.
Shockwave is ideal in these situations because it:
Stimulates angiogenesis (the growth of new blood vessels)
Promotes collagen remodeling
Breaks up adhesions and calcified tissue
Desensitizes pain receptors in the treated area
It’s not a shortcut, but it does help the healing process restart in tissues that have gone quiet.
Common Conditions We Treat with Shockwave
We see excellent results using shockwave therapy for:
Plantar fasciitis and Achilles tendinopathy
Rotator cuff pain and shoulder impingement
Gluteal tendinopathy and lateral hip pain
Patellar tendinopathy and runner’s knee
Tennis and golfer’s elbow
Chronic scar tissue or myofascial adhesions
Many of these are “repeat offender” injuries, people often try rest, then activity, then rest again, stuck in a cycle that never quite resolves. Adding shockwave can be the key that gets them out of limbo and back to full activity.
Why Pair It With PT?
This is where the real magic happens.
Shockwave wakes the tissue up. Physical therapy gives it direction.
When we combine radial shockwave therapy with targeted strength, movement retraining, and load management, we’re not just treating symptoms—we’re treating the root cause and restoring long-term function. Most patients begin to feel measurable improvements within 3–6 sessions.
It’s fast, safe, research-backed, and requires minimal to no downtime.
Why Atomic PT?
We don’t offer shockwave as a standalone service because the results come from how it’s integrated into your plan of care. Our PTs use it intentionally, after assessing where you’re stuck, what your tissue needs, and how to layer it into your loading program.
We combine manual therapy, strength work, movement retraining, and adjuncts like shockwave to accelerate healing without guesswork.
You’ll always know why we’re using it, what we’re targeting, and how it fits into your bigger recovery picture.
Ready to See if Shockwave Therapy Is Right for You?
If you’re curious about whether shockwave therapy could help you finally move past that stubborn pain or injury, book a free Discovery Visit and we’ll talk through your symptoms, goals, and whether it’s a good fit for your recovery plan.
Already know you're ready to get started? Schedule an initial evaluation at our South Boulder office, where we offer both shockwave therapy and personalized rehab designed to get you back to doing what you love—stronger and faster.
References
Speed C. A systematic review of shockwave therapy in musculoskeletal disorders. Clin J Sport Med, 2014.
Moya D, et al. The role of extracorporeal shockwave treatment in musculoskeletal disorders. J Orthop Surg Res, 2018.
Vahdatpour B, et al. Radial extracorporeal shock wave therapy for chronic tendinopathies. J Res Med Sci, 2014.
