Hey everybody it's Doctor Jo, and today I'm going to show you the top seven ways
to relieve low back pain. I'm going to show you some lying down, sitting in a
chair, and even standing up. so let's get started.
So let's start with lying down, but before we get started, if you haven't
already subscribed, make sure you click on the button down there, and if you'd
like notifications for all of my videos don't forget to ring that Bell! all right
let's lie down. so the first exercise is going to be a pelvic tilt. with the
pelvic tilts, it's not a big movement but you're really working all the muscles in
your trunk and in your core to activate them together and to contract together.
this is a great way to help relieve back pain. so with a pelvic tilt, when you're
lying down with your knees propped up is what you want to do. you usually have a
little curve in your back there. what you want to do is get rid of that curve. so
you're flattening out that back. this is sometimes hard to get and until you get
it and then it's easy to do, but I tell people sometimes if you're having a hard
time figuring out how to rotate that pelvis doing that pelvic tilt, and
flatten out that back, slide your hands into that curve and then push down into
it because you want to use the muscles back here. not squeezing here to get it
down, but those back muscles pushing down just to get that pelvic rotated. so get
that rotation and hold it for about three to five seconds and then relax. so
as you see it's not a big movement, but it's really recruiting all those muscles
there. so just hold three to five seconds relax and do about ten of those. it
doesn't have to be a lot, but it's really effective and that's really going to
help that low back pain. once you do that, then you're gonna go into a bridge.
bridging is another one where it's working all of those muscles, but you
need to do it correctly and you need to do a slow controlled movement. so I
usually tell people do one segment of a time, at a time, of your spine. so not just
going up and down like this, which is a bridge, but using each segment of
you're back to control it and go up. so it's really you can do it smoothly you
don't have to do segment segment segment, but you want to roll up and roll down.
and so coming up and you just want to get about level you don't have to arch
all the way up because then that's going to hurt your back a little bit, and then
nice and slow coming back down. so again just starting off with about
ten of these. you don't have to do a whole lot if you're having some low back
pain it might be a little uncomfortable to start with, but once you get those
muscles moving it should actually feel pretty good after you do three or four.
so if you can get to ten that's great, if you can't do like two sets of five .so
now we're gonna do sitting in a chair. so another way to relieve low back pain
when you're sitting is to use a cushion. the folks at Dr. Backk sent me their
orthopedic seat cushion, and it's really great to use a cushion when you're
sitting especially if you're sitting for long periods. and that could be at your
chair at work, it could be sitting in a car for long periods, if you happen to be
wheelchair-bound using a cushion in your wheelchair is really important, and you
can even take them on flights if you know you're going to be on a plane for a
really long time. what's great about this specific orthopedic cushion is you can
see here it's got little contours, and this is the front of the cushion, the
hole goes in the back, and I'll talk about that in a second. but the reason
this is good here is because that's where your legs go. and when you're
sitting for a long period a lot of pressure gets on the bottom of the legs
there and sometimes if there's too much pressure you can have numbness in your
legs, you can have that pins a needle tingling feeling, and with these contours
here that helps take that pressure off of it. so it's really really nice there.
the back with the opening here is really good because if you have tailbone issues
or coccyx issues, maybe you've had a fracture or it's really badly bruised, if
you've had that you know it's really uncomfortable to sit in any chair, and so
with this opening that takes pressure off that spot so it makes it really
comfortable. it's also great for sciatica or women who are pregnant because again,
with this opening here that takes a lot of pressure off the low back and so that
takes away that pain, and it takes away all just that tension and hurt in there.
so that's really nice. I'm just going to sit on it real quick and show you what
I'm talking about. the hole going in the back here, and then you can see the
little contour so this is really nice. it's comfortable you can see probably
that as soon as I sit in it, I sit up a little bit higher. I get in that neutral
position, and it's just really really comfortable. so I like that a lot. the
next treatment is the way to relieve pain is to do a piriformis stretch. and
so the piriformis is kind of in that butt area. so when you're sitting for a
long time, or you just have low back pain in general, stretching out that muscle is
a really good thing to do. so an easy way to do it when you're sitting is just
cross your leg over into a figure for piriformis position, the figure four
and keep your back straight. then you're just gonna lean forward. just this much I
can feel a stretch is right here is where I feel that stretch in that
piriformis. and the reason that's important is a lot of times when you
have that low back pain, that sciatic nerve runs under that piriformis so if
it's tight, you're gonna have a lot of that pain. since this is a stretch you
want to hold that stretch for 30 seconds and then you're gonna do that three
times on each side. I like to alternate sides because then it just gives the
other side a little bit of a break, but make sure you keep your back straight. if
you're curling over like that, I'm not really getting much of a stretch because
it's taking the tension off. if I keep my back straight and lean forward just
right there I'm getting a lot of stretch, but remember with the stretching it
shouldn't be painful. there should just be a lot of tension and maybe slightly
uncomfortable. 30 seconds 3 on each side. another way to help relieve low back
pain when you're sitting in a chair is just to do a trunk rotation. just
stretching out those low back muscles. it's really easy to do while you're
sitting if you have some chair that you can hold on to, just turn and give
yourself a little pull, stretching those back muscles into the rotation.
so you can just relax that upper one if you want to. if there's an armrest you
can put it there, you don't have to pull you can just kind of go back like this.
hold this one for about five to ten seconds, it doesn't have to be a full
thirty second stretch and then rotate back the other way. so this one you
probably want to do you know the five or ten seconds about five times on each
side. just a nice rotation and then rotation, that helps really loosen up
those low back and mid-back muscles. so if you'd like to purchase the doctor
back orthopedic cushion, make sure you click on the link up here. so now let's
do some stuff standing up. the next way to help relieve low back pain is a
hamstring stretch. you can stretch your hamstrings a whole lot of ways, but I
like a standing hamstring stretch because it's easy to do. you can do it
anywhere and you don't need equipment to do it, so a really easy way to stretch
your hamstring since they're attached to the hips the pelvis there and it affects
the low back, is just prop your leg out and keep your back straight. this is
another one just like the other stretch, you don't want to curl down. you want to
keep your back straight and just bend at your hips. so I'm just going forward like
this, I'm already getting a hamstring stretch there. if I were to curl my back
I can go further, but I'm just barely getting a stretch there. so if you keep
your back straight and just lean at your hips, you're gonna feel those hamstrings
stretching. so again this one's a stretch where you want to hold it for 30 seconds
and do that 3 times on each side. I like to alternate like I said before cause then
you just give the other side a little bit of a break. if you have something a
little higher like a stool or a chair and you have good balance, you can prop
it up on something, but again then you have to have something to do the stretch,
so I think this is just as effective as long as you keep that back straight and
bend forward at your hips. so again 30 seconds 3 on each side. so the last way
to help relieve low back pain is kind of gonna be a combination move. this is
gonna stretch out your IT band and this is also going to stretch out your QL or
your quadratus lumborum, and that's in the low back area so both
of these really affect the low back and it can cause pain if they're tight. so I
call this the ballerina move. I don't know what it's really called, but what
you want to do is you're gonna take this foot and put it back behind you. so it
can be this way we're going to stretch both sides, but the side you put back
behind you is the same side where you want to take the arm and bring it above
you. as you do that, you want to take the opposite arm and then kind of push it
this way, so almost like a ballerina. you're coming over to the stretch here
and you should feel the stretch all the way through down into the IT band if
you're doing it right. sometimes for this leg here that's going back behind
different placements a little further back a little bit closer together, foot
down, foot up, that makes a difference for people, but it's different for everyone.
so if you're just doing this way and you're not feeling a big stretch, try
moving your foot a little bit and then stretching again. so again this is the
thirty second stretch you want to hold it for 30 seconds and then do three on
each side. so again up and over down and through and then just push that hip
outwards to get that nice stretch in there. so there you have it those were
your top seven ways to relieve low back pain. if you're interested in purchasing
Dr. Back's orthopedic seat cushion, make sure you
click on the link up here, and don't forget to subscribe by clicking down
here. and remember be safe, have fun, and I hope you feel better soon.