Posture

We always hear about the importance of posture. Your mom or a teacher constantly reminded you when you were young to “sit-up straight”! So let’s take a closer look and see if they were onto something.

First, a study and the importance of posture.
Posture affects and moderates: spinal pain, headache, mood, blood pressure, pulse, respiration, sympathetic
function, homeostasis, autonomic regulation, breathing and hormone production. Sounds pretty important!
American Journal of Pain Management, 1994

Dramatic respiratory changes.
The Breath of  Life.  Did you know that after age 20, your vital capacity, (the maximum volume of air that a person can exhale after maximum inhalation), decreases 5-20% per decade! Mostly due to postural changes! - Brian K Ross, MD, University of Washington

A quote from someone in the know:
“Better than 90% of the energy output of the brain is used in relating to the physical body in its gravitational
field.  The more mechanically distorted a person is (bad posture), the less energy available for thinking,
metabolism and healing.” - Dr. Roger Sperry, Nobel Laureate

Sit-up Straight! Loss of proper joint structure and function (due to poor posture) increases adhesion formation in the soft tissue in and around the spine. - Grieve, Common Vertebral Joint Problems, 1988

Now, go take a look.
Next time you are out, start observing people over 50.  First ask yourself; do they have good or bad posture. Then ask yourself if they look healthy or not. You will discover that almost always people with good posture look younger and healthier than those with bad posture. Very interesting indeed!

How about a couple of demonstrations?
Try this:  First sit-up straight and take a big breath in and out.  Notice how full a breath you can take. Now hunch over and breathe again.  The difference is obvious.  With chiropractic adjustments and proper stretching, you can maintain or even improve your ability to breathe.

Here is another demonstration.
Try this: Stand up straight with good posture, (head directly over shoulders, no tilted head) and put your arm out at 90° to your side. Have someone behind you push down on your arm as you resist their effort. Your shoulder should hold strong. Now slump over (anterior head translation and flexion) with bad posture and have your partner push down again. Your shoulder should be weaker and you should have some difficulty holding it up.  This seems odd, as if your muscle was shut off.  Try this on your family and friends.

Explanation - with good posture, your brain can communicate via your spinal cord to all your muscles and vital organs. Your muscles and vital organs also communicate back to your brain in a kind of loop or circuit.  This is how your autonomic nervous system works.  There is a constant two-way flow of information that helps run all your systems and keeps you alive.  With poor posture, you can see the communication between the nervous system and the body does not work at 100%.  You can maintain proper nervous system function with proper posture,

Big benefit!
Maintaining your autonomic nervous system function is one of many benefits of chiropractic care
that has nothing to do with pain.  All too often, the public thinks that chiropractic care is only useful for low back pain - not so!   We will continue to discuss other benefits of chiropractic care that are not pain related in future blogs.