Why Hip Mobility Is Essential For Better Low Back Pain
2024-05-6
In part 1 of our low back pain series (you can read HERE), I discussed several misconceptions as well as more effective strategies to help pain perception. One of the key issues with low back pain is hip mobility and that probably deserves its own discussion.
A 2015 study, for example, found, “The result of this study confirmed that hip mobilization brings positive effects on pain, function and psychological factors for patients with chronic low back pain. Thus, our results strongly recommend hip mobilization as an effective treatment method along with conventional physical therapy for chronic low back pain with limited range of hip joint motion.”
Sometimes though it is difficult to determine if chronic low back pain results in less hip mobility or if restricted hip mobility causes low back pain. I don’t know if we will ever have the answer, but we do have to take into account some key concepts in understanding how to address hip mobility to improve low back pain.
A 2012 study found that core stability by itself improved hip mobility, that’s weird right? Not when you consider how our nervous system works. If we look at an example of the Joint By Joint Approach we see if we lack core stability, it makes a lot of sense that our body would “respond” by creating tightness in the areas of above and below to create that lost stability.
Research also shows that instead of just focusing on a single joint, that when we integrate the entire chain of movement, we get better results in mobility…”A more thorough stretch would be obtained if stretching included not only hip joint motion but also the entire side of the body which was under stretch at the hip, thus incorporating some of the principles of myofascial force transmission.”
That leads us to betters solutions to hip mobility like you see in the examples with different emphasis.
Physical therapist, Jessica Bento demonstrates how we give a heavy focus on integrating more stability to our core while we move through different ranges of motion that are all designed to enhance both our stability and giving us greater mobility.
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Coach Cory Cripe shows how we make the movements progressively more dynamic while heavily integrating core stability through the use of the Ultimate Sandbag by creating tension when we hold it in the front loaded position, when we are pressing it out, or holding an implement like a kettlebell overhead.
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Stretching the hip flexors also has quite a bit of research supporting the fact that it helps hip mobility and low back pain. However, people get frustrated because when they stretch them, they often end up tight again. This goes back to the fact that we didn’t actually integrate core stability to help take the brakes off of the hip flexors feeling like they need tightness to protect itself.
The more we focus on isolating the hip to improve hip mobility the less likely we are to have long term success in both improving our mobility as well as making an impact on low back pain. When we use the science and apply it well to our real world training, the results are so much more impactful and longer lasting!
Find out more in our online corrective exercise programs that are 35% off this week with code “corrective” HERE
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