Understanding the Real Source of Back Pain

By Pete Egoscue In the United States, back pain is one of the top complaints people bring to their doctors. What is the cause of this back pain that is so prevalent in our culture? First, some basic anatomy. The human spine is called "the segmented bone," meaning it's a bone that the body recognizes as one bone, in the same way it recognizes, say, the femur (thigh) or humerus (biceps), but unlike those bones, it is segmented, a bone in parts, and those parts are called vertebrae. That said, when it comes to function, the body does not recognize the individual parts of the spine; it stimulates and responds to the spine as if it is a single unit, a lone bone. But a really flexible bone. That flexible spine is why, regarding range of motion, humans have more capability than all other vertebrates. The monkey, the zebra, your pet dog -- you name it, they all have spines whose vertebrae do not allow for the full range of motion that our vertebrae allow for. This is a quintessential case of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. But there's one catch: For that full range of motion, our spine must be in the shape of an "S" curve. When the spine is an "S" it is considered in neutral position, and its load bearing is distributed evenly among all vertebrae. As a result, people with the "S" spine have no restrictions on their range of motion, no matter what they're doing -- standing, sitting, walking, lying down, surfing, playing volleyball, gardening. People with back...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news