Back & Neck Pain

There are many reasons for lower back pain, but they all usually have one or more of these factors:

• Poor motion and mobility
• Spinal, abdominal or hip weakness
• Poor coordination of spinal, abdominal, and pelvic muscles

Most lower back pain is caused by these 3 factors. When your spinal joints and muscles don’t move properly, tremendous strain occurs in your lower back, causing irritation that increases over time. Lower back pain may increase after sitting or lying for prolonged periods. With severe pain, reaching or bending down can be limited.

Weakness in the spinal, abdominal or hip muscles transfers more force onto the back. For example, when bending down, the knees are often used improperly, and spine muscles have to work harder. This can easily cause back injury.

Our therapists focus on your posture, spinal mobility, strength, flexibility and the way you move your body. As we observe these indicators, we can detect weak areas and find where the source of your problem.

A thorough plan is then devised to fix your core issues and relieve your pain quickly. We also focus on future injury prevention and educate you on proper poster and body mechanic techniques. If you are suffering with lower back pain, call us today for fast relief!

Mid back pain refers to pain in the “thoracic” spine. This is the area from the shoulders down to the mid back area. Pain in this area can be for a variety of reasons, but typically occurs from poor posture or a forward slouched posture. With this posture, your back muscles stretch out, causing weakness.

Pain can often feel like a burning or sometimes shooting pain to the mid back area. At times, pain can even feel like it is radiating under the shoulder blade. However, with most mid back pain, it can be difficult to really pinpoint the area it is hurting.

Physical therapy is very important in treating mid back pain. Our physical therapists work with you to discover spinal areas that may not be moving ideally. This limitation in movement can cause strain on the sections above and below that affected area. By improving spinal joint mobility, soothing sore muscles and restoring posture, your mid back pain can be relieved quite quickly.

We then educate you on proper strengthening and postural techniques to maintain your gains in therapy. Call us today to discover how we can relieve your mid back pain quickly and return you to a pain-free life.

Spinal Arthritis is a very common area for osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. The low back takes a tremendous strain throughout our lifetime, supporting the body, moving, sitting and repetitively bending. In addition to these contributing factors, arthritis can also be affected by genetics, age, previous injuries, diet and exercise.

With abnormal forces on the back, the cartilage on the joints at each level of the spine can rub down causing even wear, build up of bone and eventually bone on bone rubbing. This can result in painful movement of the spinal joints and chronic, achy pain in the low back. Much like an arthritic knee, the spinal joints are helped through restoring natural movement, improving support from the spinal muscles and proper posture.

Physical therapy can have a very positive effect on patients with spinal arthritis and spinal stenosis. While our therapists cannot revert your arthritis degeneration, we can restore more natural movement to the spinal joints, improve flexibility to increase joint fluid circulation, improve spinal muscle strength and educate you on correct posture and prevention techniques.

The result is that you can do more with less pain. Often, patients report significant reduction in pain and improvement in daily activities from just a few short weeks of physical therapy.

A sprain is an overstretching injury of your ligaments in your spine, whereas a strain refers is an overstretching injury to your muscles. There are hundreds of small muscles in the spine, which guide the intricate movements of each bone and multi-level joints. This delicate ballet of movement can malfunction when heavy lifting is involved.

Sprains and strains typically occur when combining lifting with twisting. If you don’t move your feet while lifting, the strain of lifting while twisting can cause injury.

While sprains and strains aren’t always a complete tear, the damage can cause significant swelling and pain deep in the back. Typical healing times can take at least 6-12 weeks.

The sooner we can treat you, the better. After the injury, it is important for you to receive therapy to reduce the inflammation process quickly. Often, the root cause of the problem is limited motion in the hips or pelvis and even mid-back, which causes abnormal forces in the lower back.

Our therapists work with you to loosen restricted areas, improve movement, reduce your pain, and strengthen your core muscles to prevent injury. It is vital to complete your physical therpay. Studies show that people who do not properly retrain their core muscles after a sprain/strain injury are more likely to re-injure their back again. Call us today to discover how we can help you quickly relieve your back pain and get back to the activities you enjoy.