I’m Allyson Marshall at CORE Therapy and Pilates. I’m a Physical Therapist and I wanted to get a really simple tip for you guys to have in your hands as a physical therapist or to send to your doctors that is going to help a lot of their patients really quickly. Something for you to try in the office… simple…
A lot of us have people that come in with low back pain, they have a positive straight leg raise and they’re gonna have a positive straight leg raise side and then the other side needs to be good or feel okay. When you get the scenario you will always be treating to that good side. It’s an exercise most people are willing to try because it doesn’t hurt… so if, for example, you have a positive straight leg raise on your right that hurts, lots of pain and then you go in the left side, I can do that, it’s fine, then treat to that good side. Do two sets of twenty on that good side and when you’re done you retest the bad side. Look back at the one you had a positive straight leg raise on and see what happens… typically that’s going to be a whole lot better…
Those are the results we’re getting, so try that simple test. If, for example, this is too hard for them, you can do a bent knee. That’s another variation of this particular exercise you can try with people and then see on this side how that bent knee leg raises. So compare the same exercise on both sides and you’re doing a test, intervention and then retesting… so if it’s not better, that is not the movement for them.
A lot of times you’ll have people that have positive straight legs on both sides, this is not the movement for them. In that case you need to have a good side and a bad side to be able to do this particular exercise in this philosophy. So, next time you have somebody in with a positive straight leg raise, good side, bad side treat that good side, straight leg, bent knee and see what happens… retest…
This is something that physicians can try in your office, pretty easily and quickly, if it works and it helps, they can continue doing this… send them to us at CORE, we can teach them and give them some more movements that are going to keep helping that back pain go away. They get a little bit more complicated and if you think this might work but they have two straight leg raises, we can look at different parts of the body, different movements that will help their back feel better…
I just wanted to get this simple tool into your hands so you can try it and evaluate and try on some of your patients…
If you are treating patients with low back pain and this helps some, send them our way so that we can progress them through our back care program that has had lots of success with transforming peoples lives…
Call 512-215-4227 to learn more… or to schedule a phone call or telehealth call with a Physical Therapist from our team.