How Long Does Physiotherapy Take? Recovery Timelines by Complaint

Why 'how long will this take?' has no standard answer

It's the question we hear most often at intake: how long until this is behind me? An honest answer starts by acknowledging there's no fixed table that applies to everyone. Two people with the same diagnosis can follow very different recovery paths, depending on the nature and duration of their symptoms, their age, their baseline load capacity, and what daily life or sport asks of their body.

What we can offer are guidelines: broad time indications based on how tissue typically heals. These help you form realistic expectations and recognise when a process is taking longer than average, so you and your physiotherapist can adjust course in time.

Guidelines by complaint: muscle, tendon, joint, and post-surgery

Muscle injuries

A mild muscle strain often settles considerably within two to three weeks, while a more significant tear, such as a hamstring injury, can take several weeks to a few months before you're back to loaded sport. Muscle tissue has relatively good blood supply, which usually speeds recovery compared to tendon or cartilage tissue.

Tendon complaints

Tendons, as with Achilles tendon and ankle complaints, generally recover more slowly than muscles because the tissue has less blood supply. An acute tendon irritation can improve within a few weeks, but a chronic tendinopathy that has been present for months often needs a three to six month process of focused, gradually increasing load. Returning to full load too quickly is a well known reason tendon complaints come back.

Joint complaints

For joint complaints, think of a sprained ankle or an irritated knee or shoulder, the timeline depends heavily on the underlying cause and whether there is additional damage to ligament or cartilage. A mild sprain can noticeably calm down within a few weeks, while complaints involving instability or osteoarthritis usually call for a longer, staged process where strength around the joint is central.

After surgery

Post-operative rehabilitation usually follows a protocol set by the treating surgeon, with fixed phases for loading, mobility, and strength. Such a process can range from a few weeks to well over a year, depending on the type of procedure. During post-operative rehabilitation, close coordination between both the surgeon and the physiotherapist is essential, precisely because the pace here is set medically rather than purely by how you feel.

What determines your recovery pace?

Several factors influence how quickly your process unfolds:

• Duration and severity of the complaint at the start: longer standing complaints generally need more time than something that just occurred.
• Load capacity and general condition: a well-trained body often recovers more smoothly, though this is never a guarantee.
• Consistency with exercises: skipping therapy at home or on the training floor almost always slows the build-up.
• Work and sport demands: the heavier the daily load on your body, the more important a gradual build-up becomes.
• Sleep, stress, and recovery factors outside the treatment room: these all play a role in how your body processes load.

At Physical Studio, we map these factors through a thorough intake and, where relevant, ultrasound imaging or VALD Force Decks measurements, so your process matches what your body can handle at that moment.

Pain after a treatment session: what's normal?

Mild, dull muscle soreness or stiffness for around 24 to 48 hours after a treatment or training session is common, comparable to muscle soreness after an intense workout. This reaction usually eases on its own.

Watch out for: sharp or stabbing pain, pain that gets worse by the day instead of easing, noticeably increasing swelling, numbness, tingling, or loss of strength. Always discuss this with your physiotherapist, who can adjust the load. For sudden, severe symptoms, fever combined with a joint, or loss of strength or sensation, contact your GP (huisarts).

Why stopping as soon as the pain is gone is the biggest pitfall

Pain usually disappears before tissue is fully healed and load-ready. That gap is the most underestimated reason complaints return. An ankle that no longer hurts can still be unstable under a sudden change of direction. A tendon that's quiet at rest can still be vulnerable under explosive load.

That's why we build processes at Physical Studio around the Recover, Prevent, and Perform phases: first get pain and inflammation under control, then rebuild the vulnerable structure's capacity to bear load, and only then work back toward full sport or work demands. Ending a process early because the pain is gone often skips exactly the last, most important phase.

Measuring progress: from pain score to performance goals

Early in a process, pain reduction is often the main measure. As you progress, the focus gradually shifts to functional goals: can you step onto a bench without your knee caving in, how many single-leg calf raises can you do compared with the other side, how does a short run or a light hopping exercise feel.

At Physical Studio we make this concrete with objective measurements via VALD Force Decks, which map strength and left-right asymmetry. That way, 'am I recovered' becomes less of a feeling and more of a measurable data point, and you and your physiotherapist know together when the next phase, returning to sport or heavier work, is a reasonable step.

A few examples of exercises that often return in later phases, provided they can be done pain-free:

• Single-leg calf raise: stand on one leg, rise onto your toes with control, lower back down slowly. Stop at sharp pain and build up repetitions gradually.
• Step-up onto a low box: step up with one leg, keep the knee tracking in line with the foot, step back down with control. Start with a low box and only increase height once this feels stable and pain-free.
• Short, light hopping drills: only relevant in later phases and always under guidance, since this type of load asks the most of healing tissue.

These are general examples for illustration, not a treatment plan. Always build up in consultation with your physiotherapist and stop if pain increases during or after the exercise.

Average number of treatment sessions per process

This too varies widely by complaint and by person, but as a rough guide: an acute, short-lived complaint often needs a handful of sessions spread over a few weeks, while a more persistent complaint or a post-surgery process can run to dozens of sessions spread over several months. Your physiotherapist discusses an indication for your situation at intake and adjusts it based on how you respond to the first sessions.

In the Netherlands, physiotherapy is typically (partly) covered from supplementary insurance (aanvullende verzekering), not from the basic insurance (basisverzekering). Exactly what and how many sessions are covered differs per policy. Check your policy or use the insurance checker on our site to see what applies to you.

Unsure about your complaint, or noticing recovery isn't going as expected? Research shows that targeted exercise therapy can effectively contribute to recovery for many muscle, tendon, and joint complaints. A physiotherapist can make an initial assessment without a GP referral and map out a suitable process together with you.