Rich, Author at Baudry Therapy Center

Back Health – Prevention Goes a Long Way

Back injuries can be draining both physically and financially. Prevention is your best option.

According to a recent 2008 study…

roughly 3.4 million emergency room department visits/year specifically for back problems at US hospitals. That’s 9,400/day!
$9.5 billion overall costs of inpatient stays due to back problems in US.
9th most expensive condition treated in US.

While all back surgeries may not be avoidable, there are many things that you can do to decrease the risk of a debilitating back injury.

1) Reduce daily sitting time. Try to sit less than 6 hours/day. Sitting leads to tightness and weakness in your back. A weak, tight back is vulnerable to injury.

2) Get up out of your chair every 30 -40 minutes. Walk, stretch, stand up or just move around. Prolonged sitting puts undo stress on your back.

3) Participate in light to moderate exercise (walking, running, strength training, aerobics) at least 3 times per week. Only 30% of the American population gets the recommended amount of physical activity. Our bodies are made to move to maintain our health.

4) Perform a consistent stretching/core strengthening routine at least 4 times per week. There are many types of activities and exercises that can help the back. Find the stretches and routines that work for you. Flexibility and strength are the keys to a healthy back.

5) Take notice and seek medical advise the first time your “back goes out”. Early intervention is the key. Long term back problems often start out as “a little tweak” in the back that resolves in a day or two. This pattern often repeats itself periodically, getting a little worse each time, until finally “the straw that broke the camel’s back” episode, where significant damage has been done. In most situations, if tended to early, back problems can be easily managed.

Here’s a great video to give you a few tips on how you can go about protecting your back.

For more ideas on how to promote a healthy back, contact us…..

– Rich Baudry, PT, DPT, OCS

Three Great Health Reads

They say knowledge is power. But given how busy we all are, finding and more importantly reading that knowledge is often pushed down our To-Do list to the point that it never happens. So, this week I wanted to start a new series here on the blog. I spend a lot of time reading news about healthy living, physical fitness, diet and such. I thought it might be helpful to you if once a week I shared the top three articles I had read that week.

So here it is… for the week of July 18, 2011, these are my Three for Thursday. Give them a read and then let me know what you think of this new series via the comments.

1) Are kids specializing too soon? Is competing at too high a level at too early of an age putting your child at risk? This article describes some of the trends with adolescent injury, and risk factors for those who compete too intensely at too early of an age. It also covers a few arguments for encouraging your child to cross train, and participate in multiple sport options.

2) Simple exercises to help your tennis game.

http://www.usta.com/ask_the_lab_pilates_for_tennis/

3) Creating power in your golf, tennis, or baseball swing depends in large part to using your kinetic chain efficiently. In other words it is the timing and sequencing of moving parts allows you to create power, much like the power created when you snap someone with a towel. See how Rory McIlroy generates power

Well that covers this week’s Three for Thursday posts. Let me know what you think… I’m all ears.

-Rich

Author: Rich

Back Health – Prevention Goes a Long Way

Three Great Health Reads

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