ABOUT 80 per cent of Australians will experience an episode of back pain at some point in their lives. In my physiotherapy practice, I see quite a range of back conditions in patients of all ages. In most cases, poor posture and tight muscles require attention, in addition to overall fitness levels. Unfortunately there is no single, magical exercise that will ‘fix’ your back, but there are plenty of stretches you can do to relieve the little niggles and twinges that we all get, and to help protect your back and neck in the long term. Here are five of...

I recently read an interesting article titled “7 minutes to get fit” with the catch line “Do twice a week. Job done”. Instantly I was intrigued, fit in two 7min sessions, this ought to be good, or too good to be true. So I began to read. Studies have found you don’t need to spend hours in the gym to achieve your fitness goals. By following a quick, tight regime you can make a big difference to your overall fitness. The 7 minute work out is a form of high intensity interval training (HIIT) which means extremely intense bursts of...

Injury prevention in cycling So you’ve all the gear and only a vague idea; you’ve started cycling, training hard for the Cycling event of the year, and you’re loving it… then some injuries start creeping in and you start to think ‘I thought this cycling malarkey was meant to be good for me!!’ Well, it is! But there are a few handy hints and tips we have for you to make sure that you last a bit longer past the casual sprint. Stability: Definiton: The ability to maintain a state of stableness, the property of a body that causes it when...

What is Core stability? Lower back pain affects 80% of the population at some point in their life. Although an episode of lower back pain may settle in 4 to 6 weeks, the deep abdominal muscles remain impaired which can lead to reoccurence and reoccurrence of low back pain. Specific exercises that retrain these deep abdominal muscles after injury are thus important for prevention of reoccurrence and exacerbation. Core stability is defined as “the ability to control the position and motion of the trunk over the pelvis to allow optimum production, transfer, and control of force and motion to the...

A complaint among many runners recently has been that of big toe sesamoiditis. What is sesamoiditis you ask? Sounds more like a seasoning for a chicken stir fry if you ask me. Let me help break this down for you. ‘Sesamoid’ is a type of bone and ‘itis’ by definition means inflammation. Thus, the condition is inflammation of the sesamoid bone or bones. There are two sesamoid bones about the size of popcorn kernels based underneath the big toe sitting within two tendons. Sesamoid bones unlike regular bones sit within muscles or tendons, rather than meeting at a joint with...

Perhaps it could be a ‘cervicogenic’ headache. This is another term to describe a headache that originates from the neck due to damage or dysfunction of its components such as the bones, facet joints, soft tissue, ligaments, discs. Prolonged postures or repetitive movements of the neck can put stress on these structures over time and cause trauma. When this happens, pain can be referred to the head, causing headaches.The causes of this trauma causing cervicogenic headaches may be traumatic, for example from a car accident or heavy lifting, or develop progressively over time. There are may common causes we see...

I’m sure we all either know or have heard of someone that does or has tried CrossFit, and quickly become obsessed with WODs, thrusters and ‘Do you even?’ memes. It’s a sport that’s come under so much scrutiny due to it’s popularity, and has copped a LOT of flack. Injuries, cult behaviour, no focus on form just get the bloody bar up whatever it takes. I’ll admit to being one of those physios that rolled my eyes when someone said they did CrossFit, ‘‘Come see me when you hurt yourself’. But I got talking to a guy I respected one...

[et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ admin_label=”section”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text”] Text Neck – With the increasing popularity and everyday use of smartphones, laptops and tablets amongst the population, there has been a major surge in people reporting headaches, neck pain, arm and shoulder blade pain – hence the term ‘Text Neck’. This scenario may sound familiar to many of you! All you have to do is look around on the train and everyone is using some sort of mobile device! It may be time to take notice of how much time you spend on your mobile devices each day. The problem with using these...

Squat Myth – Knees Stay Behind Toes A common myth has percolated around the fitness industry for a while now; physios, trainers etc, telling clients to keep their knees behind the toes while squatting. The thought process behind this being it puts more pressure on the knee joint, and increases the chance of injury. For the most part this is untrue. The knee can handle a lot of load, and as a rule of thumb, squats and lunges with knees past toes aren’t going to put the healthy knee at risk. For those with anterior (front of the knee) pain,...