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June 4, 2009

Don't Rest Your Aching Back

Have you hurt your back? Do you experience nagging chronic back pain? Turns out that going to bed and resting your back is the worst thing you could do for it. Evidence has been building for years that a sedentary lifestyle makes people more prone to back pain. Now it turns out exercise is the best thing to reduce pain and disability associated with back pain according to a new study by University of Alberta researchers.

In the study, groups of 60 men and women with chronically sore lower backs each exercised with weights in two, three or four-day weekly programmes. Some of the volunteers did no exercise at all.

Twenty-eight percent of participants who exercised 4 days per week experienced decreased pain levels. Quality of life for these participants, defined as general physical and mental well-being, rose by 28 per cent.

As someone who experiences chronic back pain, this study reinforces several things that I've learned at PT school. First, by being more flexible than the general population, I fit into a pattern that attributes low back pain to instability. Interestingly, for years I sought massage, which relieved my pain for two to three days, but ultimately did not address the underlying problem. Ironically, it may have contributed to more instability. The fix for this type of back pain is exercise, specifically exercises aimed at strengthening the core in order to stabilize the trunk before engaging in any physical activities.

Second, my pain is worse in the morning after rising from bed. Reinforcing what the study is telling us, bed rest actually aggravates my back pain. Also, I notice on my worst pain days that my low back posture is horrible and my belly tends to protrude making me look overweight. (By the way this is a trick they use in before and after pictures in weight loss products.) Conversely, on days that my posture is good, I tend to have less back pain. One of the ways I help this along is to lay on both my right and left sides for a few minutes before I get out of bed -- this helps reposition something in my back.

Third, as I've mentioned before, I come from a long line of couch potatoes. I'm recognizing that days where I'm most sedentary are followed by days of back pain. The worst thing I can do is schlump on the sofa and watch a marathon of Heros. Fortunately, I've worked around that some by putting a pillow roll behind my lumbar spine which forces my back to have better support. Taking the C out of the lumbar spine while sitting takes stress off of the intervertebral discs. I can't say enough about the benefits of proper sitting posture.

tags: massage massagetherapy wellness massage therapy bodywork health

Posted by linda at June 4, 2009 8:56 AM