Total Balance Chiropractic

Newcastle Chiropractors

Poor Posture

Total Balance Chiropractic

Newcastle Chiropractors

Poor Posture

Poor Posture

Posture is fast becoming the key focus for health and wellness in our society and for good reason. Our lifestyle and work conditions over the past decades have seen our posture decline quickly and it is contributing to most of the physical health issues we see today, especially with the slow and progressive aches and pains developing in bodies with no obvious injury or starting point.

The more posture is being examined, the more clear it is becoming that deterioration in posture is the root cause problem of most physical pains, and various mechanical health concerns. As stated by the Journal of Pain Management, “Posture affects and moderates every physiological function. From breathing to spinal pain, headache, mood, blood pressure, pulse and lung capacity are among the functions most easily influenced by posture.”

Simply put, posture is the MOST IMPORTANT component to how your body moves and feels.

Now, to explain what posture is, firstly understand what it is NOT.

Posture is not what you do with your muscles trying to hold yourself up, but what your body does when your muscles are relaxed and in a resting position.

This is an important point to understand as most therapies look at improving posture through stretching tight muscles and soft tissues while strengthening other weak muscles. This process often results in mixed outcomes with no long term changes in the shape or balance of the body as it’s missing the most important factor relating to posture which is structure.

In other words, posture is what your structural system or alignment of the bones in your body are doing to hold you up. If your bony alignment is well balanced, it will require minimal effort to hold yourself in an upright, well balanced position (ideal posture) and you will move and feel well. The function of your entire body will be optimal when posture is at its best.

The two most important reasons why posture matters

    1. Posture affects how your body feels, when it’s optimal, you don’t notice your body, in other words no aches and pains.
    2. Posture influences nervous system function. The less stress on your nervous system, the better your body operates at every level.

Causes:

Poor posture is usually a result of slow, progressive changes in the alignment of your body through often small stresses over time. These stresses lead to the body having to compensate, and each compensation can slowly lead to large changes in overall bony alignment and thus poor posture.

The more the body has to compensate the less room it has to move freely, and over time will likely start to become rigid, or feel stiff in certain areas. This will also lead to aches and pains as well as many other body health problems.

Some common examples of poor posture are:

  • Head shifting forward (forward head carriage)
  • Shoulders rolling or dropping forward (pronation of shoulders)
  • Upper body becoming rounded or humped (Dowagers Hump)
  • Developing a flat back
  • Low back becoming swayed or hyperlordotic (too curved)

There are many contributors that lead to deterioration of posture, a few everyday examples are:

As mentioned before, poor posture can lead to many associated problems such as:

neck pain, back pain, headaches, TMJ (jaw) issues, shoulder problems, hip and knee pains, degenerative changes to the body, breathing difficulties, and brain fog or inability to focus clearly among many others.

How Advanced Bio-Structural Correction™ Fixes Posture

Our chiropractic method, Advanced Bio-Structural Correction™ (ABC™) is a hands on therapy that corrects spinal alignment and posture. ABC™ is a therapy that looks at the body as a whole and not just individual parts operating separately from each other.

By acknowledging that the body is a single, whole functioning unit, we can get to the root of your body issues and truly correct them while preventing issues from developing in the future.

Correcting your structural alignment from top to bottom takes pressure off the muscles, ligaments, discs, and nerves in your back. Removing these pressures helps the body to heal naturally.

ABC™ consists broadly of manoeuvres such as spinal stretches, hands on adjustments of the spine, ribs, and lower extremities which result in consistent and predictable results in postural correction.

Correcting your spinal alignment with ABC™  helps you get real and immediate changes in posture. In short, ABC™ is a holistic healthcare system aimed at not only improving symptoms but helping bodies to function and feel their best. By improving posture through this therapy, one will notice ease in breathing, clarity in the head, and often a sense of balance in the body.

Posture and Nervous System Function

The nervous system is our communication pathway between our body and brain.

It helps to regulate and control every action in our body.

It is extremely important that our nervous system is working at its optimum if we want to function well and live a healthy life. As our structural system (mostly skull and spine) encloses and protects our nervous system, it can have a direct influence on how well our brain, spinal cord and its peripheral nerves are functioning.

If the alignment of the bones in our structural system, especially our spine start to lose their ideal shape or become dysfunctional it can impact the nervous system adversely.

By improving spinal alignment and posture, pressure and tension can come off your nervous system. In turn, this helps your body to function and feel its best while reducing the likelihood of encountering injuries and greater problems in the future.

Prevention

At Total Balance Chiropractic in Newcastle our goal is to fix bodies and help prevent injuries from returning. Ultimately, we want to make your body work well so you can enjoy life uninhibited by pain. Once posture is corrected, it is recommended to keep it in good shape. This is best managed through a protective adjustment periodically, along with our advice around day to day living.