Lower back pain may affect mood, athletic performance, the ability to sit for long periods and the ability to sleep comfortably. While surgery and pain medication may alleviate back problem symptoms, a well-designed exercise program potentially corrects the issues that caused the pain and prevents future problems. Take a proactive approach and choose exercises that address your specific problem.
Considerations
Chronic postural misalignment, muscular imbalance and injury potentially cause back problems, but tracing the cause of the pain often leads to a "chicken or egg" question. You need to determine whether the muscle imbalance caused the postural misalignment, or if the alignment caused the imbalance. If the back problem resulted from an injury, did your posture or muscle imbalance make you susceptible to the injury? Knowing these factors helps you determine the best exercises for pain alleviation. Here's an example of the issue's complexity. Tight back muscles and weak abdominals are a common imbalance, so many programs involve back stretching and abdominal strengthening. This is effective, but if tight hip flexors caused the stiff back muscles, lower back stretching may not provide sufficient relief. Stretch your hip flexors to prevent back tension from occurring.
Misconceptions
Faulty alignment potentially compresses your spinal disks, which in turn leads to back pain. Physical therapists once believed that an arched lower back, or swayback, caused disk compression. Back pain exercises reflected this belief. Instructors and physical therapists urged their clients to tilt the pelvis and press the lower back into the floor while lying in the supine position. They soon discovered that a chronically tilted pelvis causes just as much disk compression as a swayback. Experts at the Maryland Spine Center advise their clients to maintain a neutral spine, which means keeping the lower back's small, natural curve while performing back exercises. Likewise, forward spinal flexion is not the only type of back pain exercise. If your lower back problem results from sitting hunched at your desk, you may require prone, spinal extension exercises.
Expert Insight
Core exercise is often associated with lower back pain rehabilitation. Some fitness instructors and rehab experts credit Australian physical therapist Paul Hodges for developing this theory. Hodges believed that the deeper abdominal muscles, such as the pelvic floor, the transverse abdominal muscle and the multifidus are active in individuals who are free of back pain. His signature research study was published in September 1999 edition of the "Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation." Hodges used electromyographic devices to test the core muscle activity of people free from back pain. He found that they intuitively activated their core muscles a fraction of a second before moving their arms or legs. In contrast, people with back problems delayed core muscle activation, thereby compromising spinal stability. His research inspired instructors and therapists to use core exercises for their rehab and post-rehab exercise programs.
Types of Exercises
While core exercise is often used in back pain exercise programs, some people have trouble activating their core. Since the transverse abdominal muscle presses against the diaphragm to expel the air during exhalation, breathing efficiently activates your core. Take a breath in and draw your belly in as you exhale. Try to hold the abdominal contraction for 10 counts. Once you've mastered core activation, consider a stability ball exercise program. Stability ball training actually began as rehabilitation exercise.
Warning
Always get a professional diagnosis of your problem before starting a back rehab program. Different problems require different types of exercises.
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