"You are only as young as your spine is flexible" -Joseph Pilates

Repost By @drtyna 

 True story here. If you spine is all glued together from lack of conditioning, inflammation and immobility, you are gonna hurt.

Keep your spine moving. Spinal pain is a very different beast than pain in your extremities (shoulders, knees, hips, etc).

Spinal pain may be due to an actual traumatic injury, but most of the time, as I've seen in my practice of over a decade, it's usually a combo of deconditioning and stiffness (the two go hand in hand, deconditioned spines like to "glue" up).

If your spine hurts, chances are you've been too sedentary for too long. My entire spine starts to hurt if I miss too much gym time.

Keeping your spine strong and flexible is KEY to aging well, longevity, decreased pain and mobility.

You have a bunch of little muscles all around your spine holding it together. Then you have ligaments holding it together too. The muscles are supposed to support and move it, the ligaments hold it together. When the muscles become deconditioned the ligaments have to take up a lot of the job of structural integrity and ligaments that are constantly being "hung on" HURT. Where they insert on bone is highly innervated and it hurts a LOT when it gets pulled on. If your muscles around your spine are not well-conditioned and doing their job, I can promise your ligaments are being over-worked and over-taxed and ultimately, over-stretched.

Ligaments that weaken allow other things to weaken, like your discs. This is a recipe for disaster.

Also, as your spine begins to degenerate, you will feel pain in your extremities. A lot of hip pain is actually coming from the spine, for instance. Shoulder pain is often coming from the spine as well. You get the picture.

Yes, you can do this work at home daily. TONS of #Pilates, yoga and stretching videos online. It really wasn't until I started deadlifting on the regular that my pain significantly improved.

#Deadlifts fix everything, IMO. However, they can be dangerous if done wrong

Dr. Bartoszewski completes the 'Fix Your Own Back' course

This past weekend, Dr. Bartoszewski took a weekend continuing education course with Dr. Snell, regarding the evaluation and treatment of lumbar disc injuries.

If you've ever bent over to pick something up and got "stuck", have a history of sciatic pain down the back of your leg, pain rolling over in bed, getting in or out of a car or chair, or pain that's worse in the morning, you've more than likely experienced a disc injury at some point in your life.

Dr. Bartoszewski is able to evaluate your condition to determine if you are currently suffering from a lumbar disc injury.  The good news is that most disc issues do resolve with time and proper treatment.  To prevent these symptoms from coming back again and again, Dr. Bartoszewski is able to instruct you on specific movements you can do for pain relief and exercises to help strengthen your back and core, to prevent your low back pain from returning.

Dr. Bartoszewski actually experienced her own disc injury after moving to Portland.  Dr. Snell's rehab program got her moving and back to practicing and lifting in the gym after completion of the program!

Schedule your appointment at Stumptown Chiropractic today!

October is National Chiropractic Health Month

"During National Chiropractic Health Month (NCHM) 2017 this October, the American Chiropractic Association (ACA) is sharing back injury prevention and strengthening tips as well as information on the value of a conservative approach to back pain treatment with the theme “Back to Basics.” 

"Back pain remains one of the most prevalent and disabling conditions worldwide. It is one of the most common reasons that patients visit their doctors, and one of the most common conditions for which doctors prescribe pain medications. It is estimated that up to 80% of people will suffer from back pain at some point in their lives. In addition, with the overuse and abuse of prescription opioid painkillers in the United States still a major public health issue, it’s essential for health care consumers to understand that spinal manipulation and other conservative treatments can treat common musculoskeletal conditions such as back pain effectively and safely. 

NCHM 2017 focuses on back health “basics” -- the importance of overall health and injury prevention as key strategies in maintaining spinal health throughout a lifetime -- and highlights the growing body of research supporting a conservative approach to back pain treatment. "

• Exercise, ergonomic workspaces and proper lifting are a few things that can help you avoid

  serious injury.

• Sleeping on your back puts excessive pressure on your spine. Choose a side position instead.

• When texting, bring your arms up in front of your eyes so that you don’t need to look down at

  the screen.

• When reaching for something above shoulder level, use a stool rather than straining your

  neck/pain to reach.

• When sitting, keep your knees higher than your hips with your head up/back straight. Don’t

  slouch.

• If an item is too heavy, push it instead of pulling it. Use your legs, not your back when doing so.

• When sitting at a computer, make sure your feet are firmly flat with your knees lower than your

  hips.

• Never pinch your phone between your ear & shoulder. Use a headset to reduce shoulder strain.

• Did you know that back pain is one of the leading reasons why people are prescribed opioids?

  Chiropractic spinal manipulation is widely recognized as one of the safest, non-drug therapies

  available for the treatment of back pain.

• A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) adds to a

  growing body of recent research supporting the use of spinal manipulative therapy, a treatment

  used by chiropractors, as a first line treatment for acute low back pain.

• Did you know injured workers with similar injuries are 28 times less likely to have spinal surgery if the first point of contact is a chiropractor, rather than a surgeon?

World Spine - October 16, 2017

• 50% of workers will experience back pain at least once per year, often due to lack of movementor incorrect posture.

• Back pain is the most common reason for a visit to the doctor’s office next to the common cold.

• 50% to 85% of those who experience neck pain report symptoms again within 1-5 years.

• Back pain is the most common reason for a visit to the doctor’s office next to the common cold.

• You can help to prevent neck and back pain by having good posture and keeping active. Make sure you Straighten Up and Move Today!