Remember getting checked for scoliosis back in grade school? The school nurse would ask you to round your spine and bend slightly as she examined areas for imbalance. Adult postural screening is just as important as getting a scoliosis exam as a child. An imbalanced spine is more likely to develop pain, inflammation, weak muscles, injury and chronic health conditions.
Postural screening helps identify areas of musculoskeletal imbalance. A typical adult postural screening involves simple movement to check whether both sides of your body are in alignment. Typical screening involves measuring the length of your legs, range of motion within your shoulders and hips, the degree of flexion in your knees, which side you may favor when standing, stepping and walking, and whether you can move your wrists freely and seeing how much range of motion your neck may have from left to right, up and down, and in gentle circular motion.*
Chiropractors know that proper posture begins in the spine. Regions of limited mobility oftentimes create nerve interference in our daily lives. We may not realize that we are perpetuating an imbalance in the body because our movements have become habituated. It’s only when we do something simple, like reach back, and suddenly our neck or shoulders freeze up.
The reason we end up with tense muscles and pain after a simple movement is not because of the motion itself, but because of underlying issues with mobility in the spine.
Our spinal column is designed to move freely and without pain in a wide range of motion: backwards and forwards, rotating, and side to side. Due to modern and sedentary lifestyles, most of us only bend forward from the upper body; only bend backward from the lower body, and rarely utilize rotation and side-to-side movement.
This imbalance and lack of complete mobility in our spine creates weak and tense muscles and may result in areas of the spine that are “frozen” and difficult to move.
A postural screening will not only help you move more freely, it will help us create a personalized program that will improve your overall health. Poor posture and movement habits affect not just our joints and muscles, but our organs, as well. For example, never rotating or moving from side to side creates unnecessary pressure can affect the efficacy of our body’s ability to detoxify and function effectively.
Postural screening is a crucial component to begin your body’s journey back to optimal health and well-being!