Category: Uncategorized

Back Injury – H20 May Be the Way to Go

If you’ve ever sustained a back injury, even a mild one, you know how frustrating it can be. Whether you momentarily forgot the “lift with your legs and not your back” axiom we’ve repeated roughly half a gazillion times on this blog or you just “slept wrong,” even a mild tweak can linger longer than you’d expect and really cramp your style. And if the injury is more serious, it can be a major source of concern and stress.

In some cases, back pain can force patients to alter their lifestyles significantly, particularly when it comes to physical fitness. Being forced to limit—or even eliminate—activities you enjoy can rob you of important means of staying healthy, fit, and strong. And that’s not to mention the many important mental and emotional benefits physical activity can provide.

Fortunately, in many cases, not all physical activity has to be eliminated; it just needs to be modified. Let’s say, for instance, that you’re a distance runner who’s sustained a back injury. Just because all that pavement-pounding mileage may not be the best thing for your recovery doesn’t mean you can’t get in some decent cardio. How? Enter the water. (Literally.)

Make Like a Fish and Swim

Swimming can offer numerous benefits to those dealing with back pain. That said, let’s start with a caveat. (You probably already know what’s coming.) It’s important to consult your physician before beginning any new exercise or workout regimen, especially if you’re dealing with an injury.

With that out of the way…why swimming? For starters, it’s a lower-impact way to get in your cardio. Makes sense with a back injury, right? The less jarring and jostling, the better. And when paired with the right diet (consult a dietitian to learn more about what “right” means for your body and lifestyle), it can help shed excess pounds if necessary, removing stress from your joints. In short, it’s possible that swimming could not only allow you to get in your cardio while you’re injured but also, over time, pitch in to help alleviate your pain.

That said, just because swimming is a low-impact exercise doesn’t mean you can’t overdo it. Be smart, take it slow, and—again—consult your physician.

But What If…

But what if I can’t swim? Or what if my back pain is so severe that even swimming is too intense for me? Or what if I only have access to a tiny, crowded pool? Or what if I can swim, but I look so awkward doing it that strangers keep trying to rescue me?

The good news: You don’t have to actually swim for the water to do its thing. There are numerous activities that you can try in the pool that are less intense. Pool therapy, water aerobics, and aquatic yoga (yes, it’s a thing) are all forms of physical activity you can try in the pool that don’t require you to know the difference between a butterfly stroke and a breaststroke. (In one 2022 study, pool therapy won out over physical therapy when it came to pain, function, quality of life, sleep quality, and mental state.

So there we have it. Even if you’re not a strong swimmer, you can still use the water to your advantage. That said, it’s never too late to learn to swim, physical limitations permitting. It’s a great opportunity to reap all the cardiovascular and strength benefits of swimming, all while engaging your brain by learning something new.

by Brett Hearn

Sources:

Fit and Well: Is Swimming Good for Back Pain?

Harvard Health Publishing: Pool Therapy Beats Physical Therapy for Chronic Low Back Pain

Spine-health: 3 Essential Tips for Swimming with Back Pain

Eat Your Way to Healthier Joints

Maybe it comes on without warning. You’re in the middle of a routine workout—and not a particularly strenuous one—when you feel a twinge in your elbow that proceeds to nag at you for weeks. 

Or you’re climbing the stairs at your apartment and…there it is again—that familiar ache in your knee.

Or perhaps you’ve been diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis or another chronic condition, and you’d love to trade your constant pain for something so temporary or occasional as an elbow twinge or an achy knee.

If one or more of these scenarios sounds familiar, you already know a bit about joint pain. And though it may be of little comfort, you’re not alone. In a 2022 poll from the University of Michigan’s Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation, 70% of older adults reported currently experiencing joint pain.

There are a variety of treatments for joint pain depending on the type, cause, and severity. There’s one treatment, however, that many of us can choose to pursue regardless of those factors: better nutrition.

Go Mediterranean

If you’ve watched health segments on news shows or thumbed through nutrition articles while in a doctor’s office waiting room, there’s a decent chance you’ve at least heard of the Mediterranean diet. Often touted as being heart-healthy, it offers a bevy of nutritional benefits. The diet emphasizes fruits, vegetables, legumes, fish and other seafood, spices, whole grains, nuts, olive oil, and plant-based unsaturated fats.

But…Why?

One key reason the Mediterranean is so great for those suffering from joint pain is the anti-inflammatory properties of many of its component foods and spices. (We’ve talked about the anti-inflammatory benefits of spices before. Check out Spice Up Your Life! from a June 2022 post and The Upside of (Good) Home Remedies from a February 2023 post.)

You may notice some items not mentioned as part of the Mediterranean diet: alcohol; red meat; processed foods; and refined sugars, grains, and dairy. There’s a very good reason for that: these foods are known to increase inflammation. We’re not saying to never consume any of those things (that’s between you, your doctor, and your conscience); we’re just saying they’re likely not doing you any favors when it comes to your joint pain.

To put it succinctly: Excess inflammation is bad for your joints. Foods that fight excess inflammation can be good for your joints. So consume more of the things that reduce inflammation and less of the things that increase it.

In Conclusion…

Eating well is not some kind of cure-all magic bullet. (Wouldn’t it be great if all it took to relieve joint pain was to chug some olive oil and down a few joint-healthy foods?) It’s but one spoke on the “better joint health” wheel. That said, it’s an important one that, barring patient food allergies and the like, just about any doctor or chiropractor worth their salt would likely sign off on. If only all medical advice were so tasty!

by Brett Hearn

Sources:

Arthritis Foundation: Eat Right for Your Type of Arthritis

Arthritis Foundation: The Ultimate Arthritis Diet

Cleveland Clinic: 6 Foods to Eat for Healthy Joints

Harvard Health Publishing: An Anti-Inflammatory Diet May Be Good for Your Joints

Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation (U. of Michigan): Arthritis and Joint Pain

Back Popping – The Good, the Bad, and the Weird

Perhaps you’re familiar with one of the following scenarios…

It’s mid-afternoon, and you’re hard at work at your desk. You’ve been in the flow, and when you finally come up for air, you realize you’ve been hunched over for who-knows-how-long without even realizing it. You put your hands on the armrest of your chair, turn to one side, and your back releases a loud POP.
After a long day of running errands and taking care of some overdue housework—all while feeding, changing, and playing with that tiny bundle of energy that seems to have skipped walking altogether in favor of stumbling like a tiny, inebriated person all over the house—you pull up a yoga video on YouTube and on the very first pose…POP!
You’re halfway through a run when you slow for a moment to tie your shoes. You reach down and…POP!
Whether it’s intentional or not, many of us are familiar with the audible (sometimes very audible) POP or CRRRRACK that results from a stretch or a shift in position. But what causes it? Is it safe? Is it okay to pop your own back?

Read on, friends! We’re here to give you the good, the bad, and the just plain weird about back popping.

What Causes It?
What doesn’t cause it is your joints being put back into place. Your back’s various percussive sound effects might lead one to believe that’s the case—or that perhaps it’s caused by something even more traumatic, like vertebrae knocking against each other. Thankfully, we have spinal discs that prevent this!

We’ll discuss a bit further in “The Weird” section below, but the short answer to what seems to cause the pop is…gas. Somehow, “pop” or “crack” sounds better than “back flatulence,” doesn’t it?

The Good
There’s good news when it comes to popping your back (or having it popped by a professional):

It can feel good! Whether the satisfaction that comes from a good pop is due to a release of endorphins, a placebo effect, or some combination of the two seems to be up for debate.
Generally speaking, it doesn’t hurt anything to crack your back within reason, though this may change as you age and the cartilage in your back begins to wear down. (If you do feel pain, stop popping your back and get it checked out.)
The Bad
There are caveats. (Would you have expected anything different?) Here’s the flip side of the coin:

Popping your back too quickly or too forcefully can cause numerous problems, including pinched nerves and strained/torn muscles.
Over time, cracking your back too frequently can result in permanently stretched ligaments (perpetual instability) that could contribute to osteoarthritis as you age.
Back popping that is too forceful or frequent can injure blood vessels. This could result in serious complications, including dangerous blood clots with possibly life-altering—or even life-threatening—implications (strokes, aneurysms, etc.).
Don’t let anyone who’s not a professional pop your back!
It’s one thing to (carefully) pop your own back via proper stretches and exercises; it’s quite another to entrust your spinal health to someone who doesn’t have the proper training. When you’re doing it yourself, you have the benefit of first-person feedback. In other words, you know your body and you’re familiar with your pain threshold, so you’re less likely to injure yourself.

This feedback isn’t present when you hand over the reins to a friend or acquaintance, even if they swear up and down that they know what they’re doing. If you want someone else to pop your back, make an appointment with a chiropractor or other licensed professional. There’s a reason there’s specialized training for this stuff. Don’t be a cautionary tale.

The Weird
We said we’d circle back to the cause of your back’s various sound effects here, so here we go. Yes, it seems to be caused by gas, but there’s some disagreement as to precisely what’s happening—even though the process has been caught on MRI!

There’s a lubricant in your joints called synovial fluid. It contains various gases—oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide—that provide nutrients to the joints’ cartilage. When the right amount of force is applied to these joints, these gases are released. However, there’s debate about whether it’s the collapse of these gas bubbles that causes the popping sound or if it’s the creation of a gas-filled cavity when the joints stretch that’s responsible for the cracking

With all the advances made in medicine and technology, it’s kind of nice to know there are things about the human body that even the experts scratch their heads and basically say, “Well, we kinda understand sorta what’s happening, but past that…lol, who knows?”

by Brent Hearn

Sources:
SELF: What Happens When You Crack Your Back?

Healthline: What Happens When You Crack Your Back?

The Sydney Morning Herald: Why does back cracking feel so good? The ‘pop’ explained

In the Know: Chiropractor’s Back Cracking TikToks Rack Up Millions

Medical News Today: 6 ways to crack your back

The Skinny on Sciatica

If you’ve ever suffered from sciatica, you know the pain, discomfort, and frustration it can cause. Sciatica can affect people in a variety of ways, but no matter how the pain presents, it can really cramp your style.

What is sciatica?
It may be helpful to start off with what sciatica is not. Sciatica is not a disorder; it’s a set of symptoms.

Sciatica refers to pain, weakness, numbness, or tingling anywhere from the lower back through the buttocks all the way down the leg. The pain can be sharp or dull, and the symptoms may not be consistent. (You could have a stinging sensation on one part of your leg while experiencing numbness in another part.) Symptoms may be experienced at any point on the leg—even down to the sole of the foot—and are usually (but not always) experienced in only one leg.

But what causes it?
Sciatica is usually caused by a compression of the sciatic nerve, which can occur due to a number of different causes—spinal and otherwise—including a herniated disc, misaligned vertebrae, pregnancy, or tumors, just to name a few. (Seriously…there are a lot of possible culprits.) You can even develop sciatica from sitting on your wallet. (Keep it somewhere other than your back pocket, guys!)

Okay, but what is this “sciatic nerve” you’re talking about?
The sciatic nerve is the longest and largest nerve in the human body. It runs all the way from the base of the spine along the back of each leg into the bottom of each foot.

What can bring relief?
In short? It depends. Again, since sciatica refers to a series of symptoms and not a disorder, it’s important to diagnose the underlying cause. Sometimes sciatica gets better on its own; other times, treatment is necessary. There is a wide range of treatments available, including (but not limited to):

back/core exercises
stretching
ice
heat
physical therapy
chiropractic
over-the-counter pain medications
prescription pain medications
muscle relaxers
epidural steroid injections
surgery (usually a last resort)
Tell me more about how chiropractic can help!
In some cases, chiropractic adjustment can help restore mobility to the spine and reduce nerve irritability that’s causing pain, inflammation, muscle spasms, and other symptoms associated with sciatica.

There are additional benefits of seeing a chiropractor for sciatica. If chiropractic can relieve your particular symptoms without the need for medication, you can bypass the possible side effects of said medications. And since you don’t need a referral to see a chiropractor, you can “cut out the middleman,” as it were.

If your sciatica pain falls outside the bounds of your chiropractor’s expertise, they should be able to point you in the direction of a provider who can help.

by Brent Hearn

Sources:
Cleveland Clinic: Hands-On Help: How a Chiropractor Can Provide Lower Back or Sciatica Pain Relief

Cleveland Clinic: Sciatica

Health Central: What to Know About Chiropractic Treatment of Sciatica

healthline: Why is My Sciatica Not Going Away?

Penn Medicine: Sciatica

Reuters: Chiropractic Care May Ease Back-Related Leg Pain

Spine-Heath: Sciatic Nerve Anatomy