The Most Common Cause Of

Lower Back Pain

The most common cause of disability in adults under age 45 is lower back pain and by the age of 50, nine out of ten people have experienced back pain. Older individuals also suffer chronic and is sometimes function altering back pain. Most workplace or medical service designed programs have made little progress in reducing low back pain causes and consequences. At Whole Body Health, we look at all the factors that could be contributing to your lower back pain. Back pain can be categorized into upper back pain and lower back pain. This article will concentrate on lower back pain.

Both medical and holistic practitioners typically agree that the source of back pain can result for multiple reasons including: lumbar discs, vertebral and facet joints, organs, nerves and most importantly, the muscles.

Most disc, joint, nerve and muscle disorders are influenced by lifestyle postures (prolonged sitting, poor sitting/standing postures, smartphone/computer usage, etc.); work, household and recreational activities; nutritional and hormonal imbalances, as well as psychological factors. We evaluate each of these factors in determining how they are influencing your pain and what combination of these factors is resulting in your pain.

These muscles will all cause local low back pain or referred low back pain similar to sciatica (see the pictures below). It is important that the trigger point in the muscle is effectively reduced to achieve lasting relief. It’s also important to reduce adhesions in the opposing and supportive muscles and modify the lifestyle factors that play a part in the dysfunctional patterns. These reactive muscles are influenced greatly by the discs, joints and ligaments that they support. We utilize numerous myofascial therapies to reduce trigger points and myofascial adhesions.  Some of these therapies and techniques include: dry needling, cupping, manual therapy, forms of active release, muscle activation, manipulative therapy and more.

Myofascial treatment of low back pain is an effective method for reducing low back pain. One of the methods for identifying and treating your pain is the Travell Trigger Point Treatment approach to the treatment of myofascial pain. There are 15 different muscles or groups of muscles that are primary contributors in causing symptoms of low back pain. The muscles are the: quadratus lumborum, iliopsoas, abdominals, longissimus lumborum and thoracis, iliocostalis lumborum and thoracis, multifidi, the gluteal muscle complex, piriformis and obturator muscles, tensor fascia lata, quadriceps, hamstring and soleus muscles.

These muscles will all cause local low back pain or referred low back pain similar to sciatica (See the attached pictures). It is important that the trigger point in the muscle is effectively reduced to achieve lasting relief. It’s also important to reduce adhesions in the opposing and supportive muscles and modify the lifestyle factors that play a part in the dysfunctional patterns. These reactive muscles are influenced greatly by the discs, joints and ligaments that they support.

We utilize numerous myofascial therapies to reduce trigger points and myofascial adhesions.  Some of these therapies and techniques include: dry needling, cupping, manual therapy, forms of active release, muscle activation, manipulative therapy and more.