Many of us go through day after day carrying some form of pain, trying to live with it, ignore it or grin and bear it. Why? Some people are simply too busy to find time to do anything about it. Others are misinformed about the pain, and told that it is far more serious than it actually is. Some are told that surgery is the best option when in fact the problem is a simple matter of muscle imbalance. These are common occurrences. One should always get a third opinion. It may be the cheapest option too!

One example of pain management is the story of a policeman with a bone spur in his heel caused by being overweight and overloading one side of his body for 6 years. He had put up with the pain in the heel, whilst also having a sciatic nerve impingement which referred pain all the way up to his knee. He had grown used to it and had made the assumption that the only way to take the pain away was through surgery. 30 minutes of full speed G5 treatment, an oscillating massage device broke down the spur, and relieved the nerve impingement and the pain had gone. He has been pain free ever since.

One of the body’s extreme measures for pain management is muscle protection. Muscle protection reduces a muscle’s range of movement (ROM) through continuous contraction. I.e. a person can become so rigid in order to defend against experiencing pain. An example of this is a client of mine whose head sat 4-5 inches forward from its desired point, in line with the scapulae (shoulder blades). Your head can weigh anywhere between 14-16 pounds, so it can have a great influence on the shape of the thoracic and cervical vertebrae (mid to upper spine). So, as a result of being hunched in a chair, staring forward, at a computer screen for hours on end, my client had formed a thoracic kyphosis (outward curvature of the midspine) This curvature promotes the head to jut forward. After some time in this position, the thoracic spine becomes immobilized or frozen, i.e. any desired ROM can no longer be achieved. This is because the body has been in this flexed position for so long, that the muscles have shortened and tightened, in an attempt to maintain the position. The body has grown used to this position but has to remain extremely rigid in order to maintain it. Any attempt to extend the thoracic spine or open up the chest and shoulders is met with resistance. This is muscle protection.

Is the forward head position the cause of the problem? What about being seated for long time periods of time? This causes the hip flexors to shorten and tighten, thus creating an anterior/forward hip rotation, compressing the lumbar spine and promoting all of the structures above the hip to forward lean thus forming a forward head position and an immobilized thoracic spine. The body works like a kinetic chain, so it is to important to determine the cause of the pain rather than just treat the symptoms.

Ergonomics is an important form of pain management. If we take the ergonomics of a chair for example, it should be high enough so one’s knees are below one’s hips so as to stop the lower back from arching and to prevent the hip flexors from shortening. The computer screen should be at eye level or just below and close enough to read without having to thrust the head forwards and downwards, and the desk and keyboard should be at around elbow level in order to prevent the shoulders from elevating, causing the muscles of the upper back and neck to shorten and thus tighten. Perhaps using larger font sizes would be a good way of preventing one’s chin from protracting.

What to do? Well, the best way to manage pain is to become self aware as to what is happening with your body. Have your posture analyzed. Your posture is a physical history of yourself. Your R.O.M. tested, test your muscles in terms of strength along with joint flexibility and stability. Adopt ergonomics into your lifestyle such as chair and workplace ergonomics, have your movement patterns analyzed. e.g. gait analysis.

Three easy steps to managing pain:

Step 1   Begin a stretch rehabilitation program. Such programs are tailored to                                                 your own individual needs. It is important to develop and maintain good muscle and joint flexibility, for ease of movement.

Step 2            Strengthen those weaker muscle groups. Postural problems are primarily caused through muscle imbalances. It is not enough merely to develop and maintain sound flexibility because the body will always revert back to its old habits (muscle memory). Therefore, it is important to strengthen those muscles that are not doing their job, in order to retrain the body’s motor/movement patterns.

Step 3            Implement other lifestyle changes such as fine tuning your diet, assuring proper hydration and adopting stress management techniques such as exercise, sports and R&R.

Daniel Vart