Physio Explains: Can Physio Help Lower Back Pain?

Physiotherapists help people with lower back pain using exercise and hands-on treatment.

We all have lower back pain from time to time. If it’s been bothering you for a while, or if it doesn’t seem to get better on its own, then physio might be the way forward.

We see patients with lower back pain every day at Dublin Chiropractic & Physiotherapy, so we can assess your back and talk you through your options.

Can Physio Help Lower Back Pain?

This is a common question I get and yes, a physio can help lower back pain. Physiotherapy works by giving the right input or stimulus, through exercise therapy and hands-on techniques, to create a positive change or adaptation in the body. The change we are looking for through exercise therapy and hands-on techniques can be:

• Reduced pain.
• Improve mobility or flexibility in a certain joint.
• Reduced muscle tone.
• Increased muscle strength.
• Increased muscle or cardiovascular endurance.
• Increase exercise capacity or tolerance.
• Increased ability to carry out functional, everyday tasks – like reaching and grasping, lifting and carrying, or playing with your little ones.

Lower back pain often has more than one contributing factor. When the body is put under any kind of stress, it goes into a ‘fight-or-flight’ protective mode. Ideally, we flow in and out of this fight-flight mode to a relaxation and digestion mode, which allows us to recover and grow.

However, with the busy lifestyles many of us lead nowadays, we spend a lot of time stressed and have no time to recover, and this puts on toll on our body, and eventually, our body says enough-is-enough. 

We get tense and tension builds up in our neck and shoulders, we feel fatigued, overwhelmed, and we can experience pain.

Pain is usually telling us something could be modified so we can function better, under less stress or load.

How Physio Can Help Lower Back Pain

Physio can help ease muscle tension, pain and stiffness, and work with you to find a balance again. But also, through exercise therapy, you can train your body or mind or low back to be able to handle the stress and demand put on your body and mind, and manage your pain if you do experience a flare-up in the future.

Your physio will aim to settle your symptoms and work with you to build your body’s resilience so it doesn’t feel the need to go into that ‘fight-or-flight’ mode so quickly or frequently. And if is done, everyone gets stressed from time to time, you know how to manage it, to reduce the chance of it becoming a long-term problem.

My one point of advice – give it time. 

Exercise Therapy for Lower Back Pain Relief and Rehabilitation

As lower back pain sufferers, you have probably been told to rest or avoid certain activities – but that is not the best thing to do. In fact, it’s very important to keep active! And your physio can help with lower back pain relief by helping create an exercise program that is right for your lower back.

Exercise therapy helps you to manage their symptoms, through low-impact exercise – which can be swimming, cycling, or yoga! And the exercises are designed to strengthen and stretch different parts of the body so you build up a balanced set of muscles in order to support your lower back.

Exercise therapy is also a great lower back pain reliever because it helps you: – Gain and maintain mobility, flexibility, and strength in your lower back region. – Improve posture and balance. – Increase the ability to carry out everyday tasks with less stress or strain on your lower body. If you are somebody who has been suffering from lower back pain or a lower back injury, then it is important to be proactive and seek the help you need.

Low Back Pain In The Clinic

Some clients come to the clinic in a lot of pain, improve, and then return months later with another flare-up.

Even if your symptoms are gone it is important to stay active and maintain a healthy, mobile, and functional low back through regular exercise that includes; strength training, cardio/endurance training, and mobility work, like stretching, to help reduce flare-ups and support long-term health and well-being.

Physio Treatment Of Lower Back Pain

Physio treatment starts with a thorough client history, we gather your story related to the problem.

Then, we do an examination to understand what might be contributing to your lower back pain.

Physio’s then start treating. Usually, with a combination of hands-on therapies, like massage or muscle release techniques, and mobilizations, and exercise therapy – it tells the brain ‘it’s okay to movement, you don’t have to protect this area’.

We aim to ease pain and help you relax and move more freely. And we work with you to find out if there are any imbalances in muscles around your lower back – which might be contributing to some of those aches and pains.

These imbalances could be caused by lower back pain or injury, but they could also be longstanding issues that you have been living with for years. So it’s important to get an examination from your physio so we can help you lower back pain relief in the right way – whether through exercise therapy, hands-on treatments, or a combination of both!

Conclusion

Physio can help with both short-term relief and long-term management of lower back pain, so don’t resign yourself to living with it.

Seek urgent medical care (GP, A&E, or call 112/999) if you have loss of bladder or bowel control, numbness around the groin or buttocks, progressive leg or arm weakness, or pain with fever, unexplained weight loss, chest pain or breathlessness.

References 

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6251828/

[2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26985522/