Swayback- a Chronic Low Back Pain

When considering chronic lower back pain as a disease instead of an re-injury, there are a few conditions one considers.  A recent blog post outlines this idea.  Hyperlordosis, also known as Swayback, is one such disease process.

In a normal healthy spine, certain gravity lines are expected.  A gravity line is an imaginary line that can be drawn from one point on the body straight down to the ground.  Chiropractors and radiologists expect that line to pass through certain body parts on the way down.  When  those lines do not pass through the expected body parts, we call that a grav-line deviation.  It is essentially an indication of poor posture, or mis-alignment of the structures.

Ladies who are at the end of a pregnancy develop swayback due to the rapid shift in their gravity-lines. This is why so many women report lower back pain during pregnancy. Image courtesy of imagerymajestic and freedigitalphotos.net

Swayback is a type of grav-line deviation.  In swayback, there is a posterior shift, or backward lean, of the lower back.  This will over-load the delicate joints in the lower back, causing pain.  The weight of upper body is carried in the spine, but most of that weight is supposed to be borne by the vertebral bodies.

Ladies who are at the end of a pregnancy develop swayback due to the rapid shift in their gravity-lines.  This is why so many women report lower back pain during pregnancy.

Men are also subject to swayback.  Some men who develop the classic ‘beer belly’ will assume a swayback posture to balance their large gut by leaning the upper-back backwards.  This causes swayback and pain.  Needless to say, losing the beer-gut is one of the first lines to cross when battling chronic swayback pain.

Chiropractors are specially trained doctors which can help swayback deformity.  We can help reduce the inflammation around the chronically sore joints, improve and restore joint motion, and retrain the muscle tissues supporting the spine.

The downside of not correcting the swayback is that one can develop degenerative disc disease, degenerative joint disease, increase the slippage of spondylisthesis, and other painful conditions.   In a nutshell, swayback, which is a painful condition, can lead to other painful conditions.

If you suffer from poor posture, like swayback, please contact us at Innova Pain Clinic so we can get you on the road to proper posture.

Dr. Andrew White
St George UT Chiropractor

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