Back Pain Exercises

Unfortunately as one gets older, normal wear and tear also takes place and thinning and/or fraying of the tendons occurs along with a reduced blood supply but also our posture gets worse! Our head goes forwards and our shoulders more and more rounded. Doing every day tasks above the shoulder level while in this poor posture is just asking for the rotator cuff muscles to get pinched.

I have seen more and more older patients seeking help for their rotator cuff injuries. The rotator cuff tendons are close to the boney portions of the shoulder and therefore are very prone to pinching as the head goes forwards and the shoulders get rounded. In this position the tendons get pinched, inflamed and swollen and so make movements to the shoulder extremely painful.

We encourage the elderly to be more active, but with normal wear and tear, thinning and fraying of the tendons, along with a reduced blood supply and then add a poor posture, the resulting pain and discomfort is an obvious result.

Then just doing every day tasks above the shoulder then is just asking for the muscles to get injured.

Sleeping at night, unable to sleep on their favorite side and especially for ladies, doing up their bra at the back and putting washing on the line are some of the most painful tasks.

However, I have seen that once they have been taught to correct their posture, such as pulling their shoulders backwards and correcting their head position, a lot of the strain goes off their rotator cuff and less pain and discomfort results.

Another simple exercise the elderly should do is to bend forwards and allow the arm to hang loosely and gentle swing it backwards and forwards. This gaps the glenohumeral joint increasing the space between the bones so the rotator tendons can move freely.