How Core Strength Affects Your Spinal Health
By Brian Acton
Your core is an important stabilizing force in your body, linking your upper and lower body for just about every movement you make. Having a strong core can improve your balance and stability and help you do everything from play sports to perform everyday activities.
Core strength is also strongly linked to your spinal health. Here’s how core strength affects your spine.
Spinal Curvature
The healthy spine of an adult is S-shaped to help bear weight and absorb stress from gravity and movement. Some spinal curvature disorders cause the spine to be misaligned. The three major spine curvature disorders are:
- Lordosis: when the spine curves inward at the lower back.
- Kyphosis: when the upper back rounds forward.
- Scoliosis: when the spine curves sideways.
There are also conditions when the backbone loses some percentage of its normal curvature and straightens out because of a congenital condition, posture, injury, or surgery.
These conditions can cause fatigue, pain, and other symptoms. Strengthening the core can help people with spinal curvature issues to help improve their posture, relieve pain, and even slightly help correct their spine’s alignment.
Back Pain
It’s estimated that 80% of Americans will experience lower back pain at some point in their lives. If you fall into that population, you can benefit from strengthening your core. A strong core and abdominal muscles can help speed recovery from lower back pain.
This is because the core muscle groups support the lower back. If the muscles surrounding your lower back are weak, the body may rely on your ligaments, bones, or spinal discs to provide stability. This can lead to pain.
Tips for Core Strength and Spinal Alignment
There are some things you can do to strengthen your core, reduce back pain, and help fix bad posture.
- Do core exercises to improve your core strength and build up the abdominal, back, and pelvic muscles. This will help with back issues and make many physical activities easier.
- If you sit a lot during the day, you can try replacing your chair with a balance ball that requires you to constantly engage your core to stay upright, improving your core strength. If that seems a little extreme, you can use a balance ball to perform many core exercises.
- Forward head posture can take its toll on your spine over time. Use the Apex Cervical Orthosis to help reverse the negative affects of forward posture and help restore proper positioning.
Sources:
https://www.coreproducts.com/collections/cervical-traction/products/apex-cervical-orthosis
https://www.health.harvard.edu/healthbeat/the-real-world-benefits-of-strengthening-your-core
https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/fitness/multimedia/core-strength/sls-20076575
https://www.webmd.com/back-pain/guide/types-of-spine-curvature-disorders#1
