Yorkville Chiropractic and Wellness Centre Helps Back Pain Sufferers Fight Fear Avoidance and Move More
Fear of back pain? Once you’ve had it, you say “yes!” Your Toronto chiropractor gets it. Toronto back pain and neck pain patients don’t want to experience that pain again. Yorkville Chiropractic and Wellness Centre helps spine pain sufferers get their confidence back with encouragement and exercise.
FEAR AVOIDANCE DUE TO BACK PAIN
Back pain sufferers want to avoid back pain if they have any options at all. That desire - whether obvious or subtle, stated or just ruminated in the mind – establishes the ‘perfect storm’ for a behavior called fear-avoidance. Patients with persistent spinal pain syndrome - post-surgically caused or not – provoked high levels of fear avoidance, anxiety, and depression. (1) Researchers explained that the pain experience is not just physical as emotions, behaviors and beliefs are involved as well. Fear avoidant behavior like fearing object lifting grows and affects muscle behavior without realizing it. A recent study compared fear-avoidant beliefs and the use of lumbar paraspinal muscle activity while lifting in both back pain and in pain-free volunteers. Fear of lifting an object with a flexed spine as described in a questionnaire was negatively related with erector spinae activity to protect the spine from injury. The proper way to lift has been argued through the years. Lifting with a straight back has been portrayed as safer than lifting with a flexed back though research has not really supported that while lifting with a lordotic posture has been found to result in more erector spinae muscle activity resulting in muscle fatigue and pain. (2) Yorkville Chiropractic and Wellness Centre knows the importance of handling fear avoidance and its link to better quality of life.
HOW TO MANAGE FEAR AVOIDANCE
Researchers documented that back pain sufferers today ‘get’ that they must keep moving but some require a bit more support and encouragement to move and exercise because of a lack of confidence in their bodies’ ability to exercise without causing pain. The healthcare provider not only can give the latest findings on pain control but also train the back pain patient to be physical in the safest way possible. (3) If you’re that patient, Yorkville Chiropractic and Wellness Centre is your coach! We’re a team and can help you move easier and with less fear and deliver gentle, relieving spinal manipulation. Three months of chiropractic manipulation and exercise for older adults with chronic back pain improved their self-efficacy and fear-avoidant behaviors together with reductions in disability. A 30% or more reduction in the Oswestry Disability Index indicated positive response to care. (4) The more engaged a patient is with treatment, the greater the influence on the feeling of self-efficacy and disability reduction. (5) Let’s work together to control your Toronto back pain so it does not control you.
CONTACT Yorkville Chiropractic and Wellness Centre
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. Tom Menendez on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he illustrates the relief with The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management for an older patient with back pain for whom fear avoidance is logical.
Schedule your Toronto chiropractic appointment now so that if you are questioned whether you fear back pain, you can say “no”!
