In this article we discuss utilising biopsychosocial frameworks for effective diagnosis, treatment, and recovery planning for injured dancers and athletes.

Experiencing an injury can evoke a range of difficult emotions and potentially lead to negative psychological responses and social implications that in turn lead to maladaptive illness behaviours^1-3. Beyond physiological trauma, resultant psychological and social effects often impede recovery, extending the process beyond the timeline needed for physiological repair. This increases the chance of progression to a chronic injury state which is multifactorial and notoriously complex to resolve⁴. This is largely a ubiquitous phenomenon. However, for physical performers such as dancers and athletes, whose identity is often defined by their ability to perform and express themselves physically, the impact of injury can more severely affect their health and well-being⁵. This is due in part to the relationship between...

Posture is a concept most of us will have been aware of from as far back as our earliest memories. Whether through direct or implied social instruction, the inference that it matters how we hold and conduct ourselves is imbedded in the psyche of most of us. Widely described as the position in which someone holds their body when standing or sitting, the concept of posture extends beyond static alignment considerations, to include the carriage of the body during dynamic biomechanical processes during locomotion and functional movement tasks. Optimal postural form has been codified across a wide variety of societal settings including education, health and physical performance environments of military, sport, and dance. Despite this, approaches defining the biomechanical coordinates of optimal postural alignment are fraught with inconsistencies, due in part to the multifactorial and complex nature of their rationalisation¹. In this article we consider the rationale of postural...