Best Rehab: Restore, Remove, Retrain

Rehab – Muscle or Motion?

A 36 year long study was recently published in spine that appears to support the idea that keeping a body moving is key to maintaining motor control, and that the presence or absence of pain was not.

Control is the center of addressing posture with the Posture ACE model (introduced for May is Posture Month), and systematically correcting accurate-to-reality control is the objective goal of the short-duration exercises in the StrongPosture® protocols.

A great definition of motor control is from Shumway-Cook, who say it’s “how the central nervous system organizes muscles into coordinated movements, how sensory information is used to select and control movement, and how our movement patterns are influenced by our perceptions.” 1

In 1974, they assigned 221 boys and 204 girls, all aged 16 years old, to the study and tested their physical fitness and spinal control.  The subjects were then reevaluated when they were 34 years old, and then again when they were 52 years old.

Some people were active and some were not. Some had pain, and some did not.  The study concluded that physical activity is important throughout life, and relates to better spinal motion control in middle-aged men and women.

Significantly, their findings disagreed with the general contention that the ability to stabilize the lumbar spine while moving the hip joints correlates with the incidence of low back pain.

WEINIGER’S OBSERVATION: Clinical rehab integrating motor control exercise is not about one magic muscle or motion – it’s about how it all works together… and keeping it working together overtime.  The body is made to move (1st Posture Principle). 3

Philosophy for Best Rehab:

• Restore segmental motion with manipulation.
• Remove muscle and fascial adhesions with therapy.
• Retrain patterns towards symmetry with StrongPosture protocols

To keep moving well, stay active.  In other words, You have to keep moving well as you age to keep moving well as you age.

1-  Shumway-Cook A, Woollacott MH. Motor Control: Translating Research into Clinical Practice, 4th ed: Lippincott; 2012.

2- Aasa, U., Lundell, S., Aasa, B., & Westerståhl, M. (2015). Physical activity might be of greater importance for good spinal control than if you have had pain or not: A longitudinal study. Spine, 40(24), 1926-1933.

3- Weiniger, S, Stand Taller Live Longer, BodyZone Press, 2008