Your lower back, which is where many back problems occur, is supported by the so-called “core muscles”.

If your core muscles in particular are weak, it means your lower back is carrying a larger part of the strain of lifting and twisting and you are more likely to suffer low back pain as a result.

This is why a lot of back pain exercises focus on strengthening these core muscles, or at least “waking them up” and making them more flexible.

Sciatica Exercise - The Back Pull Down
This exercise is quite different to the run-of-the-mill back exercise but it is great at waking up back muscles that are often dormant.

It is best done with an elastic exercise band which you can buy from almost any sporting goods store.

As an alternative, you can use any household item that has some degree of elasticity e.g. an elastic luggage strap, an old bicycle inner tube etc. You can also use a rolled up towel, but the lack of stretch in it will make the exercise harder to do.

Sit upright in a chair with your back straight and your tummy pulled in. Raise your arms above your head holding the elastic band or towel in between them horizontally with your hands approximately shoulder width apart.

Stretch your arms up as far as they will go then slowly pull your arms behind your neck, keeping the elastic band or towel horizontal and with a slight tension on it.

Keep pulling down until the band is roughly half way down your back (if you can get that far). Rest there briefly, then raise your arms again until your arms up as far as they will go again. Remember to keep the band horizontal while you move it up and down.

Do the movements up and down slowly and steadily, don’t rush them. You can change the degree of difficulty and effect of the exercise by increasing or decreasing the tension on the band or towel.

If you pull harder to make it tight as you move up and down it takes more effort, but it has the benefit of working your back muscles harder and differently than if you do it with only light tension in the band.

Repeat the exercise about 5 times the first time you do it (depending on how fit you are and what your back tells you about the effect.

DON’T OVERDO it at first or you’re likely to end up sore and not inclined to do it again for a while and it is best done regularly.

Then you can build up the repetitions over time until you’ve reached 20, which is about as many as you will ever need to do at one time. (Feel free to do more if you want to though. I sometimes keep on going to 30 or more, especially if I’ve been sitting at a PC all day and feel stiff or tense. I might rest for a few minutes and then do another 20-30 depending on how I feel).

Remember the Better Back System gives you a complete easy-to-follow exercise and diet system for treating sciatica and back pain. Check it out here.

One of the reasons is that studies show that surgery produces no statistical difference in long-term results for curing sciatica as compared to conservative (i.e. non-surgical) care.

The key words used here are “no statistical difference”.

What this means is that in a sample of say 100 people who have back surgery, there will be:

1. Some people who obtain a positive benefit,
2. Some who end up worse off and
3. The majority for whom there is minimal difference. The average, long term result for the whole group is no difference.

It’s important that you understand how the statistics work.

The other factor to understand is that the benefits from back surgery are typically not long lasting. After 6 months or so, people tend to be back where they started.

So the summary is that you should be very cautious before embarking on back surgery, because the odds on it helping you are not good. I suggest you get at least two opinions before considering surgery.

Again, what we recommend in terms of non surgical treatment for sciatica is:

1. Change your pattern of movement, routine, exercise - if you’re not doing any exercise then start!

2. Start a set of exercises designed for your back. You can sign up for the back exercise course using the form on the left, or buy the Better Back System.

3. Develop good eating habits. Food is the fuel, lubrication and buidling material of your body. Guess what - feed it rubbish and it ain’t gonna work very well!

(a) understand what you are (probably) doing that is causing you back pain in the first place and

(b) learn more how your back works and

(c) find out what you can do e.g. siatica exercises to strengthen your back, avoid injury and stay pain free.

Most people will find out it is possible to stop back pain and sciatica in just a few weeks or sometimes even days and build themselves a healthy back.

The factors that increase the risks of you experiencing back pain or sciatica include common conditions such as:

* Sitting for long periods with a bad posture
* Driving for long periods without a stretch or a walk
* Being overweight
* Smoking
* Heavy lifting with bad technique

Of course, Its better if you get help and take action early, because it will probably reduce the number of times your back pain recurs.

Also, prevention is than a cure, so we’ll also help you learn about what you can do to stop it from happening in the first place.

Things You Can Do To Help Your Back

1. If you want learn more about your back, sciatica and how to deal with your back pain, subscribe to the free Back Exercise Course (see the form on the left of this page)

2. Try the Better Back System.

The Better Back System guides you through a set of special siatica exercises that you can do at home in about 5-10 minutes a day with a 97% chance of success.

3. Start eating properly! Give your body the nutrition it needs to function and heal itself properly i.e. a simple diet with a good selection of fresh foods and less (and ideally no) processed junk is one of the keys to goo dhealth

Because many of the foods we eat today are highly processed, we also suggest a natural nutrition supplement to make sure your body gets all the nutrients it needs. The BodyBalance supplement is one of the best we’ve found so far. Google it and you can often get a month’s free supply which will give you enough time to see if it works for you.

Remember to read our disclaimer. We are not medical practitioners and you should always consult your doctor, health practitioner or back specialist, especially if you experience progressive weakness in the legs.

Glucosamine sulfate was first used by vets to help dogs with the pain and stiffness from arthritis, because most dogs eventually suffer from arthritis. Later it was tried on people with excellent results and now the use of Glucosamine is supported by the medical establishment.

I personally use glucosamine, initially because of painful knees from playing soccer for too many years. For me the results were excellent and virtually immediate - my knees improved noticeably in about 2 weeks. Has it helped my back - harder to tell.

Certainly my back is holding together pretty well most of the time, so I’m happy to keep on taking one tablet a day that costs almost nothing - probably about 20 cents. I buy a large bottle of regular glucosamine 1000mg or 1500 mg tablets from the supermarket.

Glucosamine is naturally synthesized by the human body and is a basic building block of the connective tissues common in all joints, like the cartilages in your back and knees for example. As part of the aging process we lose glucosamine and thus cartilage through wear and tear, which frequently progresses to the common condition known as osteoarthritis.

Glucosamine sulfate can help slow this process of cartilage loss and when glucosamine is used with its partner chondroitin sulfate it can be even more effective. There have been many studies that have shown that glucosamine and/or chondroitin help to repair damage to the joints caused by osteoarthritis.

For example, in two independent 3-year randomized, placebo-controlled studies, glucosamine sulfate was shown to slow progression of osteoarthritis symptoms. After three years, participants given the glucosamine sulfate showed no joint space narrowing whatsoever. In addition, the glucosamine sulfate group showed a significant improvement in their pain levels, while there was a trend for worsening of pain in the placebo group.

Glucosamine can’t bring cartilage back, but it can prevent further loss plus reduce the symptoms of pain, swelling, and stiffness or noise in the joints and especially back pain relief.

Chondroitin sulfate is another building block of connective tissue. It actually stimulates the cartilage cells (called chondrocytes), and therefore works beautifully when paired with glucosamine to speed the regeneration and recovery of bone tissues. Well-absorbed and associated with only minor side effects, chondroitin sulfate can also decrease pain and slow the rate of cartilage loss in people with osteoarthritis.

You often see glucosamine with chondroitin and it’s worth trying this blend if glucosamine by itself doesn’t help you.

The total annual expenditure for the US is now almost $86 billion nationally. Of this prescription drugs are the fastest-growing component, according to the study quoted.

But the expenditure doesn’t appear to be helping people much (personally I’m not surprised because I find it hard to see how prescription drugs can help a problem that is largely related to lifestyle and mechanical functioning of the spine, but then again I’m not selling drugs . . .).

Pharmaceuticals made up 23% of total expenditures. Incredibly spending on drugs to combat back and neck pain grew 171% between 1997 and 2005, with narcotic painkillers ballooning an astounding 423%.

Question: Ask yourself how filling yourself with toxic chemicals can heal a largely mechanical body function?

If you want a

natural

sciatica treatment system that uses exercise and diet try the Better Back System

Note: Pharmaceutical companies’ direct-to-consumer advertising likely plays a role in the higher spending on drugs. Surprised?

The study examined data from 23,000 people in an annual federal survey and of these over 3,100 reported spine problems.

Back pain comes from a variety of sources, including:
- natural aging processes, injury,
- excessive or not enough physical activity
- obesity / carrying too much body weight.

Approx. 53% of the patients surveyed in 2005 had so-called “nonspecific back disorders” which includes
- spinal stenosis
- back ache and sciatica.

The next largest category was disk disorders with 16%.

A back injury can be financially devastating to people, Bean said. “There are some cases where you want to be justified in not doing something just as you want to be justified in doing something. It’s not always clear-cut. It’s not just an X-ray or scan. It’s a person with an individual life and personality that either tolerates discomfort or not. You have to take everything into account.”

Doctors suggest that patients with back pain do the following:
- stay active - be careful but don’t be afraid to exesrcise and use trainers, classes, coaches etc
- manage their weight,
- stay fit to better handle age-related changes,
- continue walking around if possible when they’re in pain,
- undertake physical conditioning - yoga, Pilates, bicycling and swimming can all be helpful.

To this list add:
- try physical therapies before drugs and surgery,
- review your habitual postures and movements and eliminate bad habits e.g. don’t slouch or slump, take regular stretch breaks, lift things properly, dont lift and twist.

Some people get a sore back if they sit on their walllet. Some find sleepin gwith a pillow between their knees is really helpful.

See a doctor if it doesn’t get better.

Sign up for our back health and exercise course

Especially, don’t wait to get sick and then try and fix yourself, rather take steps in advance to look after your wellbeing.

Exercise and diet are the two foundations of this approach.

Another important aspect is to review your routine daily activities and look for habits or postures that are placing stress on your back.

If you don’t do this and start swallowing a few pills each day instead, can you explain how that is going to help your back?

Unapologetically, we are advocates of natural health practices. It’s clear to me that the general American public is under the spell of the powerful “drugs and surgery” lobby groups and their health is suffering badly as a result.

You don’t have to take my word for it, below you’ll find links to eBooks with well researched information on the dangers of mainstream “healthcare”, which by the way is such a classic “big lie”.

Sickness care is too kind also, as there’s more care about profit than for the patient in many medical practices, but it is closer to the truth.

Book 1:
Death by Medicine

Book 2:
Interview with Gary Knull best selling author of “Get Healthy Now”

The Bottom Line:
More than 750,000 Americans are killed every year by American medicine.

Surely this can’t possibly be true!? Read the books for yourself and you decide.

Stay well.

For example, a doctor or back specilist may look at the back X-ray of a somebody with severe pain and see nothing unuusal apart from “routine wear and tear”. On the other hand, people who are exeriencing no back problems may have X-rays that suggest they should hardly be able to walk!

All the major nerves to your body’s extremities start by running down your spine and then branch out to these other areas. So if you have a problem with your middle or upper back you may find it affects the strength or feeling in your arms or hands.

The sciatic nerve exits the spine in your lower back and connects with your legs - thigh, calf, foot toes etc.

If your back suffers injury or degeneration it can affect the spine’s structure and/or alignment of the vertebrae (bones in your spine). This can result in pressure being placed on nerves as they exit the spine via gaps in the vertebrae.

This is what happens with sciatica - pressure is placed upon the sciatic nerve which results in pain and/or tingling and/or loss of function in your legs.

In terms of lower back and hip pain, the lower back is an area that is frequently affected by injury, aging, degeneration or wear and tear because it is an area of high stress. Lifting, bending, twisting, sitting or driving for long periods all affect your lower back in particular.

Note:
Commonly, “L4″ and “L5″ are 2 vertebrae in your lower back that are frequently impacted by wear and tear or injury and a cause of lower back and hip pain.

Once your back suffers an injury, or loss of function through aging and/or wear and tear (for example one or more disks may become thinner or distorted in shape), then 2 things are liable to happen:

1. The surrounding muscles are likely to spasm or “freeze” in an attempt to protect the spine from the threat of (further) injury.

2. This wear and tear can cause the spine’s alignment and vertebral spacing to change, thus leading to pressure being placed on nerves in and around the spine.

Both effects are likely to cause pain in the lower back and hip areas.

The Solution:
Here are ways we suggest you can treat back pain:

1. Get your spine back in alignment (as best you can allowing for injury and aging).
The options here include:
(a) active treatment from various therapists and specialists (physiotherapists, osteopaths, chiropractors etc)
(b) doing items 2-4 below and waiting for healing to occur naturally
(c) doing a mix of (a) and (b) - this is my preference
(d) back surgery (be very careful with this)

2. Review your habits with the objective of eliminating bad movements and poor posture.

3. Improve your diet - eat healthy food and/or take a natural wholefood supplement

4.3. Strengthen the muscles that surround and support the spine. This treatment of sciatica back injuries is the focus of the the Better Back System.

Whilst researching recently, I came across the Clinical Somatics technique, which is a practice that appears to bridge a number of other techniques such as Yoga, Pilates and meditation.

What caught my attention was their concept that your body and muscles become unwittingly fixed in their movements, which is an idea I subscibe to. These movements become habitual and place stress on related areas leading to pain and stiffness.

Certainly when this pain and stiffness affects the muscles in or around the back it forms a viscious circle of stiffness and restricted movement which places further stress on the back.

The exercises recommended in the Better Back System are designed to break this cycle.

The Origins of Clinical Somatics
Clinical Somatic Education is derived from the work of Dr. Thomas Hanna who was a professor of philosophy, a theologian, a writer, and a creative thinker.

His work in all of these areas hinged around the concept of freedom. During his travels, he noticed that people in industrialized nations had significantly more postural distortion than other countries, with more restriction of movement and more complaints of chronic pain or limited range of motion.

Tom found it even more astounding that people believed that as they aged, their bodies would inevitably become more stiff and less capable over time.

Following research in Medical school classes on the neurophysiology of development and control, Tom went on to develop what would eventually become Clinical Somatic Education.

Clinical Somatics clients (patients) learn slow, conscious movements assisted by specific feedback and guidance from the practitioner to create lasting, rapid improvement in flexibility and pain reduction.

The mark of effectiveness of the technique is evidenced by the number of clients who succeed in reaching their own goals of health without constant sessions with a Clinical Somatic Educator. Most clients need less than ten sessions before they have attained a higher level of functioning than ever before.

How is Clinical Somatics different from other treatment systems?

What they say is that the Somatics client is included as an active participant in the process of healing at every step. The technique also recognizes the client as someone capable of infinite growth and learning. Sessions and the movements are designed to impart as much information as possible, while allowing for each person to have their own process, learn and experience.

How does Clinical Somatics work?

They say:

“By using Clinical Somatic techniques, you will learn how to find the muscles you are keeping tight, and, in the words of Dr. Hanna, “If you can sense it, you can feel it. And if you can feel it, you can change it.” Clinical Somatic uses the muscles as a gateway into the Central Nervous System-the brain, spinal cord, and nerves.

By combining a practitioner’s feedback with slow movements to increase your own awareness and control, Clinical Somatics lets you take back control of your body and your life.”

New ideas for sciatica exercises are posted regularly at sciaticacenter.com.

It has been shown that the DRX9000 system can give great results, however its NOT A MAGIC BULLET.

It needs to be used in conjunction with a home care regimen and exercise program and has very specific treatment procedures that must be followed in order to give the DRX the best chance of working.

Unfortunately, some patients are hoping for the elusive magic bullet - the magic pill as it were

Chiropractors report conversations such as: “I spoke to a patient recently with multiple level disc herniations in her low back. She wanted to know if we could get her in for a (i.e. just one) session so she could fix her back problem before she went on vacation. When I told her the treatment required 20 one hour sessions over 6 weeks, she about fainted.”

The DRX9000 treatment regimen for the lumbar spine includes:

- wearing a specially designed lumbar support during the day to make sure things you do when you leave the clinic do not reverse the work the DRX spinal decompression system does.

- refraining from exercise.

- doing specific spinal exercises once you reach the half way point.

- drinking 80-100oz of water per day which helps to hydrate the spinal discs and flush out waste products.

Summary:
There’s a lot involved with DRX9000 decompression therapy - make sure you are ready for it and you increase the odds of a favorable outcome.

Also, try the exercises in our back health exercise course. It’s free and might just give you the change in your routines your back needs.

It originates from traditional Chinese medicine and involves the use of different breathing patterns with various physical postures and motions of the body.

Qi or chi refers to the energy flows that occur both within the human body and in the external world.

Qigong asserts that the body’s “energy field” is generated and maintained by the natural respiration of the body; gong means work applied to a discipline or the resultant level of technique. Qigong together means “breath work” or the practice of managing one’s breathing in order to achieve and maintain good health.

Qigong offers benefits for both health maintenance and health restoration i.e. it can keep you healthy if you already are, or help you get healthy if you’re currently not. This applies to back health and pain also.

Personally I susbcribe to the “whatever works” school of health maintenance.

nb. If you are interested in natural therapies try the Better Back System.

Qigong also has some esoteric or “metaphysical” aspects, but what is important is “does the practice do something useful for you”.

If the answer is yes, well obviously use it, if not try something else.

Qigong Exercise - Shoulder & Neck Stretch
If you get stiff in the shoulder and neck region this exercise is simple to do and is likely to make it better.

The great thing about this exercise is its simple and you can do it anywhere at any time for as long as you want.

Preparation:

1. Stand with your feet together and you back and neck straight.

2. Let your arms hang by your sides, palms facing your body.

3. Raise your arms to about a 45 degree angle (i.e. half way betwen hanging at your sides and poiting straight out at shoulder level), keeping them straight with your elbows locked.

4. Flex your wrists and raise your palms as far as they can go keeping the palms facing more-or-less down and your arms straight and your elbows locked.

Depending upon how flexible your wrists are, your palms may go as far as forming a 90 degree angle with your forearms. More commonly the angle will be greater than 90 degrees (it started off at 180 degrees with your palms hanging by your side).

The Movement
Basically the movement is like shrugging your shoulders. Move your shoulders up and down whilst keeping your arms straight elbows locked and palms raised upwards.

After you have done a few you will probably start to feel a hot and/or stiff feeling in your neck and shoulder area. This is fine, keep going remembering to keep your arns straight and palms bent.

Some people enjoy doing them to music. Something with a steady beat works well.

Keeping the correct posture and movement is the most important thing.

How many should you do?

Depends how fit you are and how much time you have. 20, 50, 100, 500 are all reasonable numbers for different people.

Once you get past a hundred or so you will probably start to sweat noticeably.

As always use your common sense. If you’re not particularly fit and decide you want to do 250, but feel like you’re going to die at any moment after 50 or so, its probably a good idea to stop!

Sciatica Exercise Video
You can also try this yoga exercise to help with back pain.