9 Ways To Reduce Your Back Pain | Fit And Healthy Kinetik Chain Denver Podcast Episode-8

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Jamie:

Everybody, would you like some advice that you can use this year to ease your pain? I bet you do. So studies show that about 40% of us this year will have back pain and 60% of us will have pain in the next one. to three years in our low backs. And over 80% of us will have low back pain across our lives. So I thought what we talked about today was nine ways you can ease your low back pain to help you live an active lifestyle. If you want to stay tuned to the end because I got a free bonus for you that you want to pick up as well. So while this isn’t specific medical advice for your low back pain, these are things that many of my patients have done to ease their pain and advice I give lots of times when I’m thinking about giving advice like this, I always think you know my parents live in Missouri. So if they call them and say hey, I have low back pain, what’s the advice I could give them over the phone real quickly? That could take the edge off and reduce their pain right away. Alright, so without further ado, number one, take a walk. This one almost sounds too good to be true. And it’s so easy that a lot of medical providers don’t want you to know it but walking just brisk walking for about 30 minutes is one of the best things you can do for your low back pain, generally speaking, so getting moving and getting just out especially if it’s outside but indoor treadmill is fine as well. It brings blood flow to your back and loosens that blood flow kind of warms up the muscles that will loosens them up a little bit. And then while you’re walking, you know your brain is no longer thinking about the pain and so that pain reduces which then allows your muscles to just kind of relax a little bit. So walking can create the effect on your low back pain number to break up your sitting. So again another pretty simple one, but most people sit behind a desk. What’s actually is back that up. Most people wake up. They said to have breakfast. They sit to drive to work. Is that it? Worked for eight hours a day. They sit in traffic coming home for an hour to eat dinner and sit watching TV for a couple hours and then they go to bed. So when we’re sitting That much I know many of you that is not exactly your lifestyle. But I think most of us can benefit from reducing. So we tell people that especially with low back pain, you don’t want to be sitting for more than two hours at a time. So one thing we give people as just supplies is just a reminder on your phone or you know go buy a cheap egg timer, set it and you know every 20 minutes just have a ding and you don’t have to get up and like to walk around a lot. It can literally be just standing up, walking through seconds around your desk and sitting back down will make a huge difference if you do that a bunch of times throughout the day. So don’t don’t think like you know you have to get up and you have to go spend 30 minutes walking or anything like that. It’s just literally changing the pressure on your spine can have a great impact on your low back pain. Watch your posture, closely tied to number two. But when our posture is bad, it emphasizes the curves on our spine and with low back pain when you’re happy where we have pain is typically where those curves start or end. And so it just puts more pressure there. So as you can get more upright and have those curves be appropriate. And with some support. That can really take the pressure off a little back and especially if you’re moving, having good posture can really help now posture in and of itself doesn’t necessarily cause pain. However, if you have pain, poor posture can originate. So while poor posture, I would never say is the cause of somebody’s paying, fixing it can help your pain so number four is tied in with number three. So a lumber rule and what this is something you can buy. You can search it on Amazon, I actually just tell people to make their own clothes like hoodies or pillows, and you just kind of make a tube-like formation and you just put it under your little back so that it gives you a little support when you’re in your chair. And that can help you to have those perfect curves and your lumbar spine and really help you hold that perfect posture. So like I said, I always tell people to use the cheap option so you can go out and buy them. I think they’re 15 to 20 bucks, something like that. No problem on that 20 to 30 bucks, but you can also make them with hoodies and coats and other things as well. Number five, improve your sleep. So pain is intensified when you have poor sleep not and sleep for eight hours and get into that deep sleep. Deep sleep will release growth hormones which actually help you to recover from an injury. There’s a reason why I was a baseball player. Several years ago we’re taking growth hormones to recover from injuries and stay at peak performance. Let’s do that naturally by getting a good amount of sleep and also just taking some pressure off her back number six choose sensible footwear. This one many times it goes out there for the ladies but high heels lifts your calves but it also makes you tilt your hips forward and when you tilt your hips forward it increases the curvature backwards on your back, which increases the pressure on the spinal joints. And can cause more pain. For guys. This could be like work boots or construction business such essentially and with anything with a heel and so just think about having sensible footwear that’s not really elevating you too much because those kind of fix things as well. Number seven, foam rolling so foam rolling is a little bit more of a temporary relief. But if you can use that from rolling and kind of loose, loosen some things. This can help you move a little bit better and people walk a little bit better and that can really help. Now typically I don’t suggest foam rolling on the low back where I suggest foam rolling is actually above the low back and kind of that mid back area and or on like your hips. If we can get those areas moving better. We can actually decrease the pressure on the low back as the forces of gravity and everything are now equally distributed through the mid back. The low back and the hips. Almost always the hips and the low back are tied together. If you have stiff hips, your low back is going to hurt. So foam roll to loosen everything around the low back and really help you move as optimally as possible. Number eight exercise this one can be a little tricky because exercise can many times cause your pain. But we have to figure out a way that you can move and strengthen yourself without causing that low pain. You know, exercising releases endorphins and a lot of things that actually dulled down the pain. So one of the things it also gives you a reason not to be fearful of movement. As you’re not fearful of movement. The brain doesn’t clamp down those muscles as much as those muscles aren’t as tight. It allows you to move better as you move better and reduces your pain. So it’s this nice circular way of getting yourself out of pain. So we need to exercise with an intensity to get that runner’s high. So we can release those chemicals that act as natural painkillers and gentle movements that can help to ease the tightness and pain without much of the key without aggravating that low back. And number nine, getting physical with physical therapy. That’s one of the fastest ways to use your pain. I know it’s a little bit of a burden for me and my company but we help hundreds and hundreds of people every year but as many times as possible yes low back pain will go away on its own. But many times you also learn to compensate around it and then that little back pain comes back. So if you want your absolute fastest and way to recover and you want a way that makes everything certain, seek out a physical therapist that can help you with this pain. Alright, so those are nine tips to ease your back pain. And stay tuned for a little tip on how you can get four more bonus tips on our website. Alright, so I’m sure you know somebody who has back pain that could benefit from this information. So if you do, share it with them, and make sure they can benefit from this information as well. If you personally would love to learn just a little bit more about all this information that we talked about, but don’t really feel like listening to the podcast again. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. So you can go to kinetic chain denver.com backslash bak dash paint dash Denver and you can download all this information in a lot more detail as well. So remember kinetic is spelled K I N E T i k And I hope this information can help you out. Thanks for listening.

Bye Thank you for listening to the fit and healthy Denver podcast brought to you by kinetic train Denver physical therapy. If you know anybody that you think would benefit from listening to this podcast, please share it with them. And don’t forget to hit that subscribe button so you can enjoy all the great information we’re bringing you in the next episode.

jamie

Dr. Jamie Bovay​ | DPT, MTC, CSCS

Founder and Leading Physical Therapist​

Dr. Jamie Bovay is the founder of KinetikChain Denver, a company focused on helping people recover from pain or injury, stay active and exercising, and get back to what they love to do. Jamie and his team are known both locally and nationally for finding solutions even when other providers haven’t been successful. Jamie has over 15 years of hands-on experience and works with many of Denver’s companies, athletic teams, doctors, and orthopedists to keep people active and fully enjoying life.