Hamstring Injury Health Video

The hamstring is a large muscle in the back of the thigh. Learn how to diagnose and treat a hamstring injury in this medical video.

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Check for bruising or swelling
Check area for tenderness
Rest from the activity
Ice the hamstring

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William Jones, M.D. is a physician for the Andrews Institute. The Andrews Institute is a world class institute for orthopedic and sports medicine. It is lead by world renowned surgeon James Andrews and is one of the most well known and highly regarded institutes for musculoskeletal research and treatments.

DR. WILLIAM JONES: A hamstring injury is partial tear of the muscle. The hamstring is the large muscle at the back part of your thigh and what it does is it can help extend your hip or thrust your hip when you're pushing off to sprint or to jump, and it also helps you flex your knee. And typically when you injure it, what happens is the hamstring is contracting and lengthening at the same time, and generally this happens in sprinters and jumpers, also to people who do a lot of sudden sprinting activities such as soccer players, rugby players or football players. It usually happens in that push-off phase, when you're extending your hip back because you're lengthening that hamstring but you're also contracting the muscle as well. The diagnosis, generally, it goes by the symptoms and the history of the injury as well. A lot of times, your physician will take a look at the actual area were it's injured. There might be some bruising or some swelling there if it is a pretty severe strain. Also, they will feel or palpate the area which will be very tender. And sometimes if it's severe enough, you can feel a defect. If you think you have sustained a hamstring injury, the initial thing you should do is rest from the activity that you're doing, ice the area and wrap it, put a compression garment either an Ace wrap or if you have a neoprene thigh sleeve that helps too. Go to your physician because your physician will be able to do further diagnosis and evaluation, and they can get you on a good comprehensive program; and if needed, they can get you on anti-inflammatory and analgesic medications for pain.

Hamstring Injury Health Video

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