"My joints hurt" is a symptom, not a diagnosis.
A painful joint can come from a number of different places. The joint surfaces themselves. The tendons crossing the joint and the small fluid sacs that let them glide. Ligaments left slack by an old sprain. A nerve or a joint further up the chain referring pain downstream, which is why a hip problem so often turns up as knee pain. Sometimes the joint is structurally fine and simply got more load in one month than it had seen all year.
Those causes do not respond to the same treatment, so the useful question is never only where it hurts. It is which tissue is producing the pain, and what keeps feeding it. That is what your first visit at Pyramid Physical Therapy & Pilates in San Antonio is for: testing, not guessing.
The pattern tells us more than the location.
How a joint behaves across a day, a week and a workout narrows the list of possible causes quickly. One important exception: if a joint is hot, red and swollen, or if joint pain arrives alongside fever, a rash or unexplained weight loss, see a physician first. That combination needs a medical work-up before physical therapy.
Pain That Warms Up
Sore for the first few minutes of activity, better once you are moving, then sore again a few hours afterwards.
Pain Under Load, Not At Rest
The joint is quiet while you sit and speaks up under body weight, stairs, a loaded lift or a long walk.
One Tender Spot
A specific point you can find with a fingertip, which usually implicates a tendon or a bursa rather than the joint surface.
Swelling That Comes and Goes
A joint that puffs up after activity and settles overnight, a signal it is being asked for more than it can currently take.
Giving Way or Instability
A knee, ankle or shoulder that feels like it might let go, common after an old sprain that was never fully rehabbed.
Several Joints At Once
More than one joint aching over the same period, which can point to a systemic cause worth raising with your physician.
Test it, name it, then treat that.
Your first visit at Pyramid Physical Therapy & Pilates is a differential assessment. We load the joint in specific directions, test the tendons and muscles crossing it, check the joints above and below for referred contribution, and watch you walk, squat, step or reach so we can see the joint doing its real job rather than lying on a table.
What follows depends entirely on what that finds. A stiff, guarded joint gets hands-on manual therapy. An overloaded tendon gets a progressive loading program, because tendons get stronger with graded work and weaker with rest. An unstable joint gets control and strength training, often through Pilates-based exercise where the resistance can be dialed precisely. If the findings point to something outside the scope of physical therapy, we say so and help you get to the right physician.
Texas direct access means you can start without a doctor's referral. We verify your insurance benefits before you arrive, and we can usually get you in within 48 business hours or less.
Request Your Visit
In Texas you can see a licensed physical therapist without a doctor's referral for up to 10 consecutive business days. We are in-network with Aetna, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Humana, Medicare Part B, Tricare and United Healthcare.
Tell us where it hurts and when it hurts most. We call back to confirm a time and check your benefits before you arrive, usually within 48 business hours.
Thank you.
Andrea will call you back to confirm a time and verify your insurance benefits. If you would rather talk it through now, call the clinic directly.