Physical therapy and back pain

There is no question that physical therapy is of enormous benefit to individuals with back pain. Some health care professionals highly recommend this treatment to patients with back pain. One of the problems with treatment for back pain is that the business has become lucrative. Some physicians only send patients for treatments which are exorbitantly expensive and where they make some money. For example, surgeons tend to recommend surgery or pain injections.

While medications can relieve back pain, they do not cure the problem. Even the pain relief with medications is temporary. While physical therapy was never strongly emphasized in the past, it is now appreciated that physical therapy alone is far superior than many other treatments available for back pain. Today, the trend is to push individuals with back pain to enter physical therapy programs because of the dismal failure of surgery and other spinal decompression modalities.

Over the past two decades, a lot of evidence has accumulated that reveals the benefits of physical therapy. When done properly, physical therapy can help the process of healing much faster, reduce pain more effectively and also prevent recurrent episodes of back pain. Unlike the past, physical therapy is much more refined. It is not simply lifting weights or jogging around on a track. The specialty is individually designed to help the individual build strength, improve posture, increase flexibility, and adjust his/her lifestyle.

Physical therapy today focuses more on prevention and promotion of healing. In each and every case, physical therapy aims to restore function and increase mobility in the individual.