Treatment
Drugs prescribed to relieve pain or relax muscles in
backache disorders do not cure common back problems. These can become habit forming and may actually perpetate the disease in case of excessive intake. Certain safety measures, especially, for people in sedentary occupation, are necessary to relieve and prevent backache. The most important of these is exercise which improves the supply of nutrients to spinal discs, thereby delaying the process of deterioration that comes with age and eventually affects everybody. Save exercise include walking, swimming and bicycling. The latter should be done keeping the back upright. Controlling one’s weight is another important step towards relieving backache as excess weight greatly increases the
stress on soft back tissues.
Those with sedentary occupations should take a break to stand up every hour. Soft cushioned seats should be avoided and position should be changed as often possible. Persons with back problems ahould sleep on a firm mattress on their sides with knees bent at right angles to the tprso. They shouldtake care never to bend from the waist down to lift any object but instead should swat close to the object, bending the knees but keeping the back straight, and then stand up slowly. Neck tension arising from long hours at the desk or behind the wheel of the car be relieved by certain neck exercise. These include rotating the head clockwise and anticlockwise, allowing the head to drop forward and backward as far as possible and turning the head to the right and left as far as possible several times. These exercise help to loosen up contracted neck muscles which may restric the blood supply to the head.
The diet of those suffering from backache should consist of a salad of raw vegetables such as tomato, carrot, cabbage, cucumber, radish, lettuce and at least two steamed or lightly cooked vegetables such as cauliflower, cabbage, carrot, spinach and plenty of fruits, all except bananas. The patient should have four meals daily. They may take fruits and milk during breakfast, steamed vegetables and whole wheat chaptis during lunch, fresh fruits or fruit juice in the evening and bowl of raw salad and sprouts during dinner.
The patient should avoid fatty, spicy, and fried foods, curd, sweetmeats, sugar, condiments as well as tea and coffee. Those who smoke and take tobacco in any from should give them up completely. Protein and
vitamin C are necessary for the development of a healthy bone metrix. Vitamin D, calcium, phosphorus and the essential trace minerals are essential for healthy bones. foods that have been processed for storage to avoid spoilling have few nutrients and should be eliminated from the diet. Vitamin C has proved helpful in relieving low-
back pain and averting spinal disc operations.