Most people know what it's like to have a bad back. The worst ones can leave you laid up for weeks and others become a constant irritation that occasionally settle down but invariably return with unfailing regularity.
Reports I've read state that 20% of people at any one time suffer from low back pain, 80% of all adults will experience at least one episode of back pain in their lifetime, and around a half of those 80% will never actually find out the cause of their pain. This is of real concern considering it is acknowledged that the medical profession has, at best, a limited understanding of the condition.
An article I saw on the causes of lower back pain by the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (AHCPR), in the form of a review prepared by an outside group of medical professionals, stated:
'Even with today's technology, the exact reason or cause of low back problems can be found in very few people'
Other self proclaimed experts will say the cause of back pain is typically a sprain or strain to a ligament or muscle as they focus on the point where a person feels pain, without any consideration to what might be happening in the rest of the body to set up that sprain or strain.
The most common scenario for someone who gets back pain is for them to go and see their doctor. If the pain has been there for over a month or it involves nerve pain they get sent for X-rays or a more sophisticated scan and depending on what the doctor does or doesn't see they are prescribed drugs, stretching and/ or exercises, rest and perhaps surgery.
You may be sent to a conventional form of therapy where the practitioner, although confident and keen to do what they can, will tell you there is no simple cure for chronic back pain. At this point you have spent a lot of time and money and more often than not at the end of multiple sessions nothing has really changed.
In other words, once you have chronic or recurring back pain the majority of people are told to limit or curtail their activities for the foreseeable future and in some cases permanently. “You just can't play tennis anymore, your back can't handle it.”
I am still reminded by one of my patients that, before I fixed their daughters back pain, their specialist had told them she should never lift anything heavier than a pencil during her life and that her promising sports career should be stopped immediately. She went on to play many years of sport and as an adult does volunteer work with the State Rescue Services and very rarely has any back problems now....... continues
To download your own FREE copy of ‘The Bad Back Book' along with 2 FREE bonuses ‘How I fix Pain Using Massage and Bodywork', plus access to a 70 minute talk Steve Lockhart did on the subject at a recent workshop, click here.
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