Yoga for Back Pain-- Part I

Low back pain is one of the most common reasons people seek out physical therapy care, and clients often ask if yoga can improve their low back symptoms. Therefore, as part of National Yoga Month this September, Tru-Care Physical Therapy would like to share some insight why yoga is often considered effective in the treatment of back pain.

Yoga has many benefits that assist in the management of low back pain that include improving posture, increasing flexibility, and stabilizing the spine by increasing core strength.

Weight lifter's Elbow??

Weight lifter's elbow? Never heard of it!  

How about Mommy's elbow? Carpenter's elbow? Typer's elbow? Salesman elbow? ..... No?

Perhaps Tennis or Golfer's elbow?   Yes I am sure that most of you have heard of these 2 issues.  But all the others are the same problem.  Any of the options above create similar stress on the elbow as does tennis or golf. Mom tries to do all her tasks one handed while keeping hold of a crying child; Joe swings a hammer or holds a drill overhead for hours at a time; Jean decides that doing 3 sets of lateral raises with increased weight should be OK; and Fred sits at his computer programming all day long with fingers flying across the keys.

All of these tasks stress the forearm muscles.  These muscles actually are responsible for motions and movements at the wrist. The common extensors are the muscles that pull your wrist up and they attach to the outside condyle (bony area) of your elbow and the common flexors attach to the inside condyle and they pull our wrist down.  They also control the movements of the fingers for opening and closing the hand.