What to Do About Back Pain and Joint Issues

The human skeleton is a marvel of evolution. Unique among all animals, human beings have adapted to full-time upright walking, and this gave our primitive ancestors many evolutionary advantages. Our ancestors gave up their tree-dwelling, fruit-eating lifestyle to hunt game across Africa on foot, and this led to the modern human anatomy. This includes a distinctive S-shaped spine, an upright pelvis, long and tough leg bones, and arched feet. Over time, however, a lifetime of upright walking may result in wear and tear, and even today, people often suffer from back pain, joint issues, cramped muscles, and more. Major back trauma such as slipped discs and malformed bones call for surgery, but everyday back pain and joint stiffness can be addressed with non-invasive methods instead. Today, many medical professionals offer these non-invasive methods for curing back pain and spinal issues, joint stiffness, cramped muscles, pinched nerves, and more. This includes chiropractic adjustment tools, manual muscle testing devices, and other physical therapy equipment. At a hospital, a physical therapist may use such manual muscle testing devices to measure whether a patient has full recovered. Such manual muscle testing device can track the patient’s progress in the meantime.

Causes of Back and Joint Pain

Many American adults are in need of chiropractic adjusting tools, yoga, automatic strength tests, and more, but why is all this joint and back pain happening? Back pain is among the most common types of chronic pain in the world today, and a few common causes are well known. Years of hard manual labor may wear out and stress the spine, muscles, and joints, causing pain over time. Many surveyed Americans blame ongoing stress for their back pain and related issues, and pregnant women may experience back pain later in their pregnancies due to the added weight. Back pain or joint pain may also be the result of injuries, such as while playing sports. Finally, simple old age may cause back pain due to many decades of upright walking and fighting gravity. This is known to compress the spine, strain muscles, pinch nerves, and more.

Around one in three women in the United States today suffer from back pain, as do one in four men. Around 50% of all working Americans report having back pain symptoms each year, and experts have predicted that 80% of the American population will suffer from back pain sometime in their lives. In fact, back pain ranks second among reasons why Americans visit their doctors, behind only upper respiratory issues. It is believed, meanwhile, that around 31 million Americans, young and old, men and women, are suffering from back pain. The good news is that all sorts of non invasive treatments are out there, and finding such treatment starts with visiting one’s doctor.

Getting Treatment

What can be done? Once a patient visits their doctor and reports back pain, they may be referred to an expert such as a chiropractor or a yoga studio. Chiropractors are known for using their bare hand and simple tools to readjust the body’s bones and related muscles to relieve pain and pressure. Many Americans who visit a chiropractor later report great satisfaction with their care and say that they would do it again if need be. Meanwhile, a yoga expert may offer guided, private lessons on how to bend and stretch the body in natural ways to relieve pressure on joints, muscles, and nerves. Over the course of several guided sessions, the patient may find their chronic back pain or joint pain relieved, and they may restore their full range of motion and flexibility.

An injury victim at a hospital may undergo physical therapy, often known as PT, to restore their balance, muscle strength, flexibility, and more. Physical therapists will help their patients restore their walking capability, use of their arms or spine, neck, and more. The patient’s progress may be measured with a manual muscle testing device, which tests the patient’s strength and flexibility when the patient stretches out rubber cords and other items. The level of resistance that the device has to create to resist such movements may measure the patient’s flexibility and strength, and this allows the therapist to determine when the patient has fully recovered and may be released.

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