LifeCare Chiropractic

The Best Chiropractic Care in Mesa, Arizona

yoga

BALANCE BUILDING ACTIVITIES IN ELDERLY PEOPLE IS NECESSARY – (10-15-03)

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Vibrating insoles and balance control in elderly people

I must admit I was pleasantly surprised at this study. Considering that a large proportion of our proprioceptive input (our sense of “where we are” in space) comes from the soles of our feet and this input is reduced as we get older the results of this study make sense. And for such a safe intervention to improve balance can have drastic effects on the health of or elderly if we can reduce the number of falls. Couple this with other balance-building activities such as yoga and tai-chi.

The Journal : Back Issues

Read entire article here

Healing Yoga is Bad for Chiropractors

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Most patients are in my office because they’re locked up. Muscles, ligaments, tendons and joints just aren’t moving. Anything that stimulates movement is good.

This is why exercise and chiropractic can be so powerful for so many.  Because we take areas on a patient in pain and help them move better.  It really can be put into that simple of terms.  This is why yoga is so dangerous for a chiropractic practice.  Of course, our office still recommends yoga heavily.  After all, our main goal is to destroy our practice by having patients do everything they need to do outside of the office so that they no longer need us.  Unfortunately not likely to happen, it still remains a primary goal for every patient that enters the office.

As I mentioned, so many patients are experiencing pain because they just don’t move.  We live in a sedentary society both at work and at home.  If we exercise, many opt for a linear aerobic exercise like the elliptical, treadmill or stair-climber.  These lock us into a specific movement and really don’t fully allow our bodies to move.  Weight training is not too much different.  We isolate a muscle and work out that muscle to make it grow bigger.  Again–this does not take our bodies through full ranges of motion.

Activities like the martial arts (my personal choice), hiking (second choice), tennis and racquetball require your body to move in unrestricted patterns.  THIS is what we need to stay healthy and pain free.  So where does yoga fit in?

Perfectly.

This particular study demonstrates just how effective yoga can be at controlling pain.  Here are the details:

  1.  Researchers looked at 6 studies
  2. These included back pain, rheumatoid arthritis, headache/migraine were the most common
  3. All studies reported positive effects in favor of the yoga interventions
  4. With respect to pain, the overall improvement was 26%
  5. For pain-related disability, overall improvement was 21%

Not too shabby overall considering the safety of yoga.  In addition, none of these address the potential stress reduction that can occur with yoga as well, which would have benefits far beyond pain and disability.

So, if you are dealing with chronic pain issues, make sure you combine your visits to your chiropractor with regular yoga sessions to get the best benefits.

What type of yoga do you find the best for your body and mind?