The Canadian Chiropractic Association reports that up to 85 percent of working people can expect to experience some sort of low back pain during their lifetime.
That’s a lot of people. And a lot of people in pain.
In today’s static world, filled with poor posture, inactive bodies and core muscles as tight as jelly, it’s really not that much of a surprise. Heck, even seemingly healthy people who work out on a regular basis can be plagued by low back pain every so often (yours truly included).
How to avoid this lower back pain or how to prevent it from occurring? To help us make the right choices for our low back, Caring Hands Physiotherapy and Massage, Calgary physiotherapists have come up with some ideas. They will help us understand low back pain and its treatment, as well as some tips on how to prevent it.
Physiotherapists explain that the majority of acute low back pain is usually mechanical in nature, meaning there is a disruption in the way the components of the back (which include the spine, the muscles, intervertebral discs, and nerves) fit together and move.
Some examples of mechanical problems are muscle strains – often from lifting, reaching, excessive sitting and using poor mechanics in movement.
Joint (articular) sprains is another issue. The joints that connect the vertebrae (called facet joints) can sprain just like any other joint in the body. This often happens with excessive bending, lifting, and twisting, as well as overuse and poor posture.
These mechanical problems can also come from a joint in the back being hyperactive. Physiotherapists say that while a hyperactive joint is OK if the muscles that surround that joint can’t control things then dysfunction and pain can occur.
A common hypermobile joint in the low back are the sacroiliac joints (SI joint). Your SI joint is a critical linkage system between your lower spine and pelvis and requires a strong core, specifically the transverse and obliques, to control and stabilize the joints.
Stiffness can also cause a problem with the low back, as it often creates hypermobility somewhere else to compensate the stiffness.
The discs, which hold the vertebrae together, can also break down and become a source of discomfort when they start to press on a nerve.
So, how can a physiotherapist help with lower back pain? Well, a physiotherapist can help identify what the problem is, how important is proper treatment.
Once the problem has been identified, physiotherapy treatment can include exercise to stretch the tight muscle, strength exercises to control the movement of the spine (core), muscle release techniques including IMS, acupuncture, foam rolling and electrotherapeutic modalities like TENS to desensitize the muscle and help it relax.
Joint manipulation or mobilization may also be used, as well as spinal traction for decompression or manipulation.
Will a physiotherapist be able to relieve the pain right away? Sometimes yes and sometimes no. When problems have been in the making for years it often takes several visits to retrain and correct the underlying problem (physiotherapy calgary nw).