A recent study suggests almost 30% of amateur golfers and just over 20% of tour players play with low back pain. Interestingly enough, back pain is typically a symptom from one or more compensation patterns from instability or dysfunctional movement in other parts in our body.
Whereas other joints are viewed as being either mobile or stable during the golf swing, our back, made up of numerous articulating segments, needs to be stable in the low back and mobile in the upper back. To achieve this daunting task, numerous muscle groups must work in precise coordination in a smooth sequence of events in order to provide an efficient and functional golf swing while preventing injury to the player.
Clients coming to my office with a “back pain” diagnosis receive a thorough movement and soft tissue evaluation to pinpoint areas away from the back that may be contributing to the symptoms.
In most cases, musculo-skeletal imbalances lead to asymmetrical compression into one or more areas of the spine contributing to pain.
Treatment usually involves joint and soft tissue mobilization to normalize the imbalances followed by re-education and re-patterning of the muscles to work together instead of against each other.
When the muscles work against each other it is called a “cross syndrome” leading to inefficiency, overuse and injury.
I will explore “cross syndromes” next month and a few manual therapy approaches to help correct them.
Good Golfing,
Michael Rende, OTR
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