Physiotherapy & Exercise for Osteoporosis

Osteoporosis

Living with Osteoporosis can feel very daunting. After diagnosis the thought of feeling ‘fragile’, the fear of falling and fracturing and concerns over what activities may be right and safe for you. Advice is often conflicting and confusing about how to strengthen your body in a safe way. The impact of fractures also varies greatly from person to person. Many people recover well but for some a vertebral fracture can lead to long term pain management. Through education, exercise, reassurance, and the correct advice I want to help you make informed choices about how to manage your condition. To be able to move and flow with confidence, to build your stamina and balance in a safe way, to build strong bones and prevent falls. For some of you this may be a gentle rehabilitation programme, for other this may be heading to the gym to feel confident lifting weights.

A little sciencey bit…..Latest research is championing exercise, not just for traditional weight bearing/impact (e.g. walking) but also loading the bones through multidirectional strength training. Only 20 % of vertebral fractures occur due to falls, with the other 80% being ‘silent’ or ‘spontaneous’. We need to address this by training our bodies to lift properly, adapt good postures and work on targeted multidirectional strengthening exercises. The pulling action of muscles on our bones gives information to our bone building cells - ‘osteoblasts’, on how to lay down the best, strongest architectural structure within the bone, this creates more tensile strength (strength in different directions), reducing the risk of fracture. Strong muscles equal strong bones.