The Benefits of Weight Loss for Back Pain Relief

By Dr. Michael Minond

Obesity is a growing epidemic that has affected both adults and children around the world. It is a condition where the fat tissues of the body are more than the required Body Mass Index (BMI) of 30. For instance, a 5 feet, 7 inches tall male and weighs 220 pounds have a BMI of 34 and is considered obese.
Poor diet and sedentary lifestyles are known to lead to obesity. In turn, obesity significantly contributes to risk factors of coronary heart diseases, diabetes, respiratory problems, colon cancer, and high blood pressure. However, not everyone is aware that obesity is also the number-one contributor to back pain.
Our spine is responsible for carrying the body's weight. When too much weight is carried, though, the spine can become stressed and overburdened. Over time, built-up pressure on the back can cause serious damage and result in conditions like osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, sciatica, herniated discs, back strain and other sources of excruciating back pain.
Conditions Caused By Obesity
You may try to ignore your weight gain, but you should never dismiss the fact that when you are obese, you may develop conditions leading to back pain. The following are some examples of this.
The spinal disc serves a soft cushion or shock absorber between each vertebra of the spinal column. Because of injury or degeneration due to aging, these discs can swell and rupture resulting in wear and tear. The extra weight in the stomach carried by your spine also leads to the wearing and tearing of the spinal discs, and over time can lead to a herniated disc.
A herniated disc may exhibit symptoms of numbness, muscle spasm, and weakness. Back pain only occurs when the nerve roots and the spinal cord around the vertebrae are pressed and pinched by the protruding disc. Herniated discs can also be a factor as to why a large number of obese people have sciatica, because nerves of the legs are pressed by herniated discs.
Osteoarthritis, otherwise known as arthritis of the spine, is very common in obese people. The load carried by the spine increases the stress on the spinal joints and leads to the breakdown of cartilage. Symptoms may appear not only in the lower back, but also in the weight-bearing joints like in the hands, hips, knees, and neck. Weight loss is recommended, but in extreme cases, joint replacement may be feasible, and of course surgery can bring about risk of other health complications, as well.
Lordosis is the abnormal curving of the lower back. The spine is as one with the pelvis. When it moves forward or back, left or right, or as it rotates, the spine adjusts right along with it. Lordosis is developed when the excess weight carried in the midsection pulls the pelvis forward leading to the tightening and straining of the lower back. People with lordosis may also suffer from tension, immobility, stiffness, and pain in the lumbar area and surrounding affected area.
Benefits of Weight Loss For Back Pain Relief
The obesity epidemic did not happen overnight. Industrialization, modernization, and our sedentary lifestyles have made a tremendous impact to our eating behaviors. With fast food restaurants everywhere, convenient supermarkets, and labor-saving devices, we no longer have to put forth much effort to produce and prepare our foods. Added to those are the high calorie and sugary foods that we love to eat.
Obesity is a result of an energy imbalance where you eat too many calories and do not get enough physical exercise to burn them off. Sadly, being overweight can add strain to the ligaments and muscles of the back. Our spine can become stressed, lose its natural strength, become tilted, or develop an unnatural curvature.
While weight loss can help improve serious health problems, it is also common sense to think that it, too, can relieve back pain. If you are obese now, there are many ways available, such as dieting and exercise, that double its benefit for weight loss and restoring your overall health.
Effective Exercise for Losing Weight And Back Pain Relief
Though, exercise is recommended for all types of back pain, some conditions may need a few modifications, including just the right level of intensity and amount of time needed to do the exercise for safety and rehabilitation purposes. If pain follows your exercise, you may try gentler routines, such as Yoga, Pilates, and back strengthening exercises as an introduction to help condition your back. They may include stretching and low impact aerobic exercises that you can start doing for 15 minutes a day.
To begin with, you can do a standing hamstring stretch. It is a great stretching exercise for your hamstrings and your lower back. You may also do this lying on your back for extreme back pain conditions. Stand tall with your right foot forward just a few inches in front of your left leg. Then, bend your left knee while pulling your abdominals slowly inwards. Next, lean forward perpendicularly aligning your shoulders and arms and rest both palms on your left knee for balance. You may repeat this 8 times both on each leg.
Quadruped Opposite Arm/Leg Raise is also a great back strengthening exercise. For your starting position, you should be on all fours with your hands perpendicular to your shoulders and knees beneath your hips. Make sure back are naturally aligned and core is tight. Then, extend the left leg while simultaneously lifting the right arm until they are aligned with the body. Return to the starting position and repeat with your right leg and left arm.
Side plank is best for the abdomen, back, and shoulders. It doesn't require much movement, but does require strength and balance to hold the position. Lie at your side for your starting position. Next, lift your body off the ground with your forearm and side of your foot. Hold this position for 8 counts, tighten your core, and relax your shoulders.
There are many more exercises that can both strengthen your back and help you lose weight. However, it is important that you also go back to the basic reason as to why you are overweight. A proper diet that includes low carbohydrate and high-fiber meals is more effective for weight loss when combined with exercise.
Dr. Michael Minond is a well-respected Chiropractor in NYC who specializes in advanced chiropractic care techniques such as Applied Kinesiology and Integrated Nutrition. Learn more by visiting his website.
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Massage Therapy As a Treatment for Sciatica

By Richard Lobbenberg

Massage therapy can provide tremendous relief for most any complaint that is musculo-skeletal in nature. And because massage therapy is a natural medicine, it has benefits beyond the obvious; indeed, massage can help you with improving your immune system and even relieving you of feelings of depression! One of the best ways that massage helps with your musculo-skeletal system, however, is by helping to treat sciatica. Sciatica is essentially a term for any pain that affects your lower back, hip, and leg. Usually the pain only affects one leg or the other, and may not even be felt in your back but just one of your legs alone. The reason it is called 'sciatica' is that the pain appears to radiate along the pathway of your sciatic nerve, which starts in the lumbar and sacral regions of your spinal cord. The nerve (actually a bundle of five separate nerves in the beginning) then exits from this region (aka the lumbosacral area), passes behind your hip joint, and runs down the back of your thigh, where it splits again into now only two separate nerves: the peroneal nerve (which travels down the outside of your lower leg to the top of your foot) and the tibial nerve (which passes through your calf muscle and into your heel and sole of your foot). Therefore, sciatic pain can travel quite a distance, affecting in addition to your lower back, a large part or portions thereof, your leg.
The causes of sciatica generally include spinal disc herniation, spinal stenosis (where your spinal cord is compressed for a number of possible reasons), piriformis muscle inflammation, pregnancy, or other issues such as a tumour or trauma of some kind. Before seeking natural therapy, be sure to have your doctor rule out anything that might require surgery or extreme medical intervention. Where your doctor can find no reason for your pain or offer no distinct medical treatment other than medication and exercise, massage therapy may work as an excellent adjunct.
Massage therapy works in a number of ways to affect relief of your sciatica pain. For example, when you're being massaged, something called the relaxation response occurs, whereby your nervous system involuntarily returns to normal. This is basically the opposite of the fight-or-flight response, where your body responds to stress by elevating your blood pressure and increasing your heart rate. Another way massage therapy helps you is by improving your circulation and lymph drainage, thus helping your body eliminate toxins that have been building up in your tissues. In addition, your nerve conduction will improve, as nerves have an easier time growing and functioning in well-conditioned muscle.
When you combine the benefits of massage therapy with the pain and discomfort of sciatica, excellent results can be achieved. Sometimes it takes more than one session to fully relieve all of your pain, but if you're willing to do the right exercise and take the advice of your properly trained, registered massage therapist, you will find the relief that you've been looking for.
For more info, visit us at: http://yellowgazeboclinic.com/health-info/pain-relief/sciatica/.
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The Many Sciatica Exercises

By Gary Nye

Did you know that as many as 40% of us will get sciatica, or at least some irritation to the sciatica nerve at some point in our lives. The sciatica nerve comes from either side of our lower spine and it will travel through the buttocks and pelvis. Then it passes through each upper leg before it finally divides at our knee into branches that go into our feet.
Whatever puts pressure on nerve, or irritates this nerve can cause pain that will shoot down the back of one buttocks or thigh. And might even go into the feet This sensation of pain can vary in many degrees. It might feel like a mild ache, or a sharp, burning in our lower back or an extreme at least some discomfort. Sciatica is also capable of producing weakness, numbness and tingling.
It's important to understand that back pain therapy is a three stage process where you need to get your back better through exercise, the first stage is medication, usually NSAIDs, the second stage is exercise and the last stage is physical therapy.
It is my belief that if you have sciatica and use these exercises you will be helping to build your body up and not automatically turn to pain killers, but try to solve the problem more naturally as with exercise. Below are the exercises you should try. I have listed both traditional and Yoga exercises if you prefer.
Living with Sciatica can really be a terrible thing to have to live with which is why many people turn to using pain pills to help relieve the symptoms. The pain will come and goes, but any movement might become extremely painful.

• Sciatica Exercises
• Stomach toning exercise
• Gluteal toning exercise
• Deep Stomach muscles toning exercise
• Back stabilizer exercise

This is where a simple easy exercise will greatly improve the Sciatica nerve.
What kind of Yoga exercises are recommended?

• Head-to Knee
• Eye-of-the=Needle
• Bridge
• One-Legged Pigeon
• Corpse Pose
• Go gently with these poses at first.

These are just some of the Yoga positions that would be beneficial if you are able and willing to do them. Do not strain yourself. If it hurts stop doing the exercise immediately.
Yoga is a great way to get rid of that Sciatica pain. Not only that but it also helps to strengthen muscle and leaves the body toned and fit. Among muscle strengthening forms of exercise this ancient form of exercise has been proven to be one of the best. That's why many of the Sciatica sufferers have turned to this form of exercise.
Gary Nye is a health care practitioner who writes on and suffers from back pain and pain problems. Visit his site for great articles on pain and back pain at [http://backpain.roadtowellness.info/gnye/]
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Sciatica and Physical Therapy for the Treatment of Lower Back Pain

By Anna Woodward

Whether young or old, most people experience the symptoms of sciatica at some point in their lives. Like death and taxes, you could say that lower back problems are just another inevitable part of life. Sciatica is caused by the irritation or compression of the sciatic nerve located in the lower back above the buttock. This irritation can result in lower back pain, leg numbness, leg weakness, and even nerve damage. "Sciatica" itself is merely a collection of symptoms rather than a standalone syndrome. One of the most frustrating aspects of experiencing lower back pain is that, because the area is so sensitive, it is often difficult to find the source, and therefore remedy, of the problem. This can give the condition a component of mental anguish along with the excruciating physical pain. While painkillers and prescription anti-inflammatory drugs can be helpful in alleviating symptoms, persistent physical therapy is often the most effective treatment.
Spinal disc herniation is one of the most common causes of sciatica. This occurs when the fiber of a spinal disc slips and causes the soft inner portion of the intervertebral disc to bulge out, pressing on the sciatic nerve. This is usually caused by wear on the back, often by jobs that require repetitive sitting, bending, squatting, and heavy lifting. The pain caused by a ruptured disc can be debilitating and last months to years, even with proper treatment. Accordingly, the cure for this form of sciatica is most often a combination of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, physical therapy, and anti-depressants. Surgery is considered as a last resort as back surgery can result in other painful chronic conditions.
Another cause for sciatic pain is chronic muscle tightness. While this form of sciatica can also be chronic, it can perhaps be the most easily managed by consistent stretching and by watching posture and sleeping habits. If no obvious physical cause for sciatic pain is identifiable on an MRI or X-ray then physical therapy may be the best option available. Often physical therapists may be able to identify the specific cause of sciatic pain and will often prescribe a unique routine of stretches and exercises that are specially designed to remedy the person-specific problem. People with this type of sciatica may experience muscle weakness and numbness in their lower regions. Physical therapy can help patients regain this muscle strength and show them stretches that take pressure of their inflamed nerves.
For any case of sciatica, no matter the cause, physical therapy is always the preferred option because is empowers patients to take recovery into their own hands and helps them manage their pain on an individual level. While sometimes tedious, therapy offers a level of care and prevention that other treatments like painkillers cannot. While many sufferers may seek painkillers for instant pain relief, therapy and persistent stretching are often the most healthy and effective options.
In Jersey City, physical therapy help can be found at Gotham City Orthopedics, LLC. Learn more at http://www.gothamcityorthopedics.com.
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How to Relieve Sciatica Symptoms With an Everyday Object!

By Justin Benjamin Nisbett

What is Sciatica?
If you have Sciatica Symptoms there's little doubt surrounding it. Let's first define what Sciatica Symptoms are so we understand what we're experiencing.
Sciatica is the name for pain originating from the Sciatic Nerve which happens to be the longest and largest nerve in your body. It can be the size of one of your fingers where it meets your lower spine. In which it travels from your lower back to your hips, buttock, down the leg where it branches at your knee (both your legs have sciatic nerves).
What are the Symptoms of Sciatica?
Now that we know what the Sciatic Nerve is what are the symptoms of Sciatica?
There can be pain felt along where the Sciatic Nerve runs and can be felt deep inside your buttocks, pain can also travel down the back of your leg and occasionally in your foot.
This pain can be accompanied by tingling sensations, pins and needles, numb feeling and occasionally weakness in your leg. But take note Sciatica is usually only in one leg but can rarely affect both.
How to get Sciatica Relief.
So how exactly do we instantly relieve most Sciatica Symptoms and Pain?
Using balls, with the correct technique you can use a ball like object to create space between your sciatica nerve and the objects pinching it creating your Sciatic Pain.
There are a number of balls on the market which are designed in shape and size to relieve Sciatica however some sufferers have found even Tennis Balls to work effectively.
How to Relieve Sciatic Pain.
Using either your purchased product (generally more effective due to their shape,size and density) or a simple tennis ball. Laying flat on your bed place the ball around the mid section of your lower back and lift your feet off the ground holding both your knees with your hands in a fetal like position. Hold this position for 30 seconds and finally lower your legs. Move the ball down to the next position (usually the same distance as the width of the ball) and repeat the process.
Disclaimer
This article contains general information about medical conditions and treatments. The information is not advice and should not be treated as such.
You must not rely on the information in this article as an alternative to medical advice from your doctor or other professional healthcare provider.
If you have any specific questions about any medical matter, you should consult your doctor or other professional healthcare provider.
If you think you may be suffering from any medical condition, you should seek immediate medical attention.
You should never delay seeking medical advice, disregard medical advice or discontinue medical treatment because of information in this article.
Neither the author nor the publisher of this article take any responsibility or liability for any actions of any persons relating to information provided.
More information: Sciatica Symptoms
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Saunders Lumbar Traction Is Giving Sciatica Pain Relief

By Regina Rain

If you have been battling back and leg pain for a long time and just want to find a way to reverse the effects so you can get on with your life free of pain then this might just be what you have been searching for. Sciatica pain relief is a few steps away with decompression treatments using the Saunders Lumbar Traction technology.
As a back pain sufferer you may have come across the term decompression and learned about the large DRX 9000 machine that some Chiropractors have in their office so they can charge you an arm and a leg for a few treatments to turn your life around. Or perhaps you came across and tried the inversion table technology that turns you upside down to stretch out your back in a most ridiculous but desperate way for sciatica pain relief. Both of these techniques are trying to find a way to take pressure off your compressed and bulging disc. Kudos to them for trying to treat the sciatic pain at the source but the DRX 9000 treatments are much too pricy and the inversion table puts you in a most uncomfortable position with blood rushing to your head and the feeling of your ankles being pulled apart. Saunders Lumber traction has taken this decompression concept and simplified it into a portable device that you can have with you at home or while you travel and you don't have to hang upside down or spend thousands of dollars that you don't have when your off work with a back injury.
How the Saunders Lumbar Traction Works
Finding sciatica pain relief is a few steps away with the simple Saunders Lumbar Traction therapy. This unit is within a flat case that unzips and opens up to lie flat on the floor of your living room, your couch, or your bed. There is no need for assistance in getting yourself set up and doing the treatments, just lie down in it, put on the two belts, tighten, then use the hand-held pump to increase the pressure which in turn will increase the stretch felt in your lower spine. With the guidance of your physiotherapist go up gradually to the pressure he or she recommended you reach, hold this for a few minutes then release the pressure. Relax for a few minutes then bring up the pressure again and repeat the process a few times. Doing this stretches apart your vertebrae and releases the pressure on your compressed disc, your disc can then reabsorb moisture, oxygen, and nutrients that it needs to make it strong again. Giving more space to your compressed disc will encourage the bulging tissue to retract then release pressure on your irritated nerve root.
DRX 9000 Compared to the Saunders Lumbar Traction Unit
Visiting a chiropractor for an injured disc could irritate your disc more. The sudden spinal adjustments done to the spine could cause more tearing to the worn out bulging disc. Some chiropractors have a large DRX 9000 that pulls the spine to give it a nice stretch just as explained about the Saunders Lumbar Traction unit above. This device can give your compressed disc more space and allow it to retract. To get these treatments it will cost you $125 to $150 per visit and you would need to commit at least three weeks if not more to the treatment. Saunders Lumbar traction will give you the same treatment in the comfort of your own home anytime you want and will cost from $400 to $800 only once.
Importance of Physiotherapy
My experience with sciatica has taught me that physiotherapy is imperative and outweighs chiropractors by far for the simple fact that chiropractors treat bones that our out of alignment and physiotherapists treat soft tissue injuries. The plan set forth by my chiropractor did not give me the pain relief I needed and so I had to try something else. That something else was physiotherapy and the therapist that treated me had training in intramuscular stimulation that he used to relax my knotted and guarding muscles almost instantly. Relaxing and stretching out stressed muscles in your lower back and leg is important for sciatica pain relief. This in turn allows you to get the full benefit from Saunders Lumbar Traction treatments by increasing your amount of stretch. Your physiotherapist can help you understand your condition better and give you the exercises needed to regain strength in your leg as well as improve your posture.
Regina has developed a broad understanding for the underlying cause of back and leg pain and has started the Sciatica Pain Relief blog to share with other's what can help them. The best treatment for her was with the Saunders Lumbar Traction that you can find out more about on her site.
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A Wider Angle Look At Sciatica And A More Permanent Solution

By Jay Uecker

We're going to be discussing the subject of sciatica in this short article. Sciatic nerve pain manifests itself as various types of pain extending from the low back or bum, all the way down to the foot. It's often related in any number of ways making it sound extremely painful: burning, electric shock, being stabbed with an ice pick, etc.
Sciatica takes its name from the large nerve that extends down the back of the leg, the sciatic nerve. Exiting from the anterior part of the lumbar spine and the sacrum are nerve roots. These nerves fuse together to form one large nerve known as the sciatic nerve. The sciatic nerve is roughly the same thickness as your thumb. It leaves the posterior pelvis between the sacrum and hip bone and travels down the back of the leg, all the way to your foot. If there is a problem inside of the lower back or sacrum, the nerves there can be irritated and create irritation of the sciatic nerve. in addition to lumbar and sacrum nerve root irritation, muscle tightness can cause sciatic pain. There is a muscle that spans the sacrum and the hip bone called the piriformis muscle. The sciatic nerve leaves the pelvis through this muscle. Sometimes a restricted piriformis muscle can create sciatica by squeezing the sciatic nerve.
The foundation for my experience with sciatic pain comes from the concept that people tend to create protective, survival patterns within their nervous systems from the moment that they are in the womb, from the time that they are babies, and even when they are young kids. These survival patterns typically include deep tension being stored in the pelvis, belly and low back. This early on in our development, the brain doesn't have the capacity to think yet, the nervous system is just sensing into the environment. Resonance or entrainment are a couple of the terms that describe the manner in which our nervous systems are sharing information with the world around us during this stage in our lives.
We, of course, pay special attention to our father and mother as we're sensing into the world around us. As we're feeling into our parents their systems might give us the message that certain sensations, emotions and feelings are a threat; that the world's not safe. Our system uses muscle tension, posture and breath to wall off and disconnect from the problematic sensation, feeling or emotion. It utilizes our posture in order to keep certain aspects of our bodies separate from other parts and to create stretching within our spinal cord. When our spinal cord is being stretched it diminishes its ability to transmit information and reduces our ability to feel. Our system also shuts breathing down to certain areas because if you move an area and breathe into it you have to feel what is going on there and our nervous systems made the decision that certain areas are not safe to feel, and for that reason it locks the area down with muscle tension and shuts breath down to that region.
The core tension that is contained inside of the pelvis, low back and belly due to the survival programming in our nervous system, can manifest itself in a variety of ways, sciatic pain being just one of them. It could also lead to digestive system problems, reproductive organ issues, and other symptoms that are associated with the low back and pelvis area.
You can surf the web and get numerous remedies for sciatica. These options are likely to give short term relief at best. If the sciatic pain is approached from a more holistic perspective, a more permanent change can be brought about. It's possible to invite the nervous system out of survival mode so that it can observe the defensive patterns and dissipate the tension that's involved. However, in order to effect a change this way, the pelvis, low back and belly need to be approached with the greatest sensitivity.
Jay Uecker, D.C. has been practicing Network Spinal Analysis professionally since 2002. His educational journey has taken him from Lincoln, Nebraska where he received a Bachelors Degree in Exercise Science, to Minneapolis, Minnesota and Northwestern College of Chiropractic where he received his Doctor of Chiropractic Degree. He has served in places like India and Peru and is currently the director of the Network Life Center in Louisville, Colorado. Click the link to learn more about sciatica relief and other topics related to health wellness and awakening.
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