Illustration: (c) Anne Asher 2006 Licensed to About.com

It's Monday. With the long week looming ahead of you, why not make a plan to incorporate some back fitness into your work? And if your neck is healthy (i.e. you don't have an injury or condition that would preclude it) a neck roll may help work out the kinks.

Keeping up with your exercises while at work may not only help you avoid pain and drain, but it might also help you get ready for summer. Andre Panagos, M.D., a physiatrist specializing in sports medicine and co-director of the New York Presbyterian Hospital Spine Center says:

What you do most of your day is key to preventing injuries during leisure time. Working in an office, for example, could increase your risk of injury. Your body is not designed to be static for five or more hours every day. Prolonged sitting inactivates the core muscles, which are responsible for supporting the back.

If you plan to step up your activity for summer, maybe its time to get more active at work! The Daily Spine has a few more tips.

| How to Do a Neck Roll | Back Pain | Desk Exercises for Your Back |

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Photo: (c) Alex Wong Getty Images

Sad news today. The wife and daughter of Senator Harry Reid D-NV suffered a rear end car accident.  Mrs. Reid is in a DC hospital with a broken neck and back.  She's listed in serious condition. UPDATE: On Friday, she had surgery.  The senator's daughter suffered a neck injury, but has already been released from the hospital.  Fortunately, neither women had life-threatening injuries, and feeling in the extremities of both remain intact.

Serious trauma to the spine may damage the spinal cord and cause paralysis.  A bad car wreck is one way this type of injury occurs.  It may cause a vertebra to dislocate (which ruptures ligaments that hold the bones together).  Severe dislocations are often accompanied by bone fractures, as well. For the person involved in the incident, rehabilitation is a long, hard road.  Generally they experience either complete or incomplete paralysis and loss of feeling below the level of the injury for the rest of their life.

Based on the press information that's been issued so far, we don't know if Mrs. Reid will be paralyzed. We'll have to wait for the surgeon's comments. I'll keep you posted.

UPDATE: Just in (March 12, 2010) The Associated Press reports that the surgery "successfully stabilized Mrs. Reid's broken neck", and that although her injuries are serious, her doctor says Mrs. Reid "is not at risk of paralysis".

Senator Reid had this to say on his Twitter page:

Thanks to everyone who has reached out with kind words today. Our family is grateful for your support and prayers.

| 10 Ways to Prevent a Broken Neck | Back Pain | What is a Broken Neck? |

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Illustration: (c) Anne Asher 2007 Licensed to About.com

Back pain is ubiquitous. Lots of new treatments and tests have emerged in recent years to try to address it. A 2009 study led by Richard Deyo, MD, PhD, and notable patient advocate specializing in spinal treatments, found that Medicare payments for spinal epidurals, spine MRIs, opioid pain management, and spinal fusions have shot up significantly since 1994. This is most likely a combination of more procedures done and an increase in cost for those services.

So how well did the recipients of the treatments and tests do? Deyo says there are not a lot of follow up studies, but the ones that have been done suggest that back pain is actually increasing. For example, he reports that the US Medical Expediture Panel Survey found several factors that usually go with back pain (like limitations in what you're able to do and your mental health) actually rose between the years of 1997 and 2005.

One might think that with the increase in costs and use of new spine treatments, the people on the receiving end would feel better for the experience.

Read more...

If you have chronic or subacute low back pain, what do you do to cope with it?

A recent study from England looked at 700 people with back pain lasting longer than about a week (subacute and chronic back pain patients). They gave approximately half of the patients an assessment and advice on what to do, or "standard treatment". The other half received cognitive behavior therapy. CBT is a short term therapy that helps people identify the things that trigger their pain, and to take actionable steps to manage them.

The researchers found that after a year, not only did the CBT help reduce the peoples' pain, but it did so at a low cost.

About.com's Depression Guide, Nancy Schimelpfening, has a great intro article on cognitive behavior therapy.

_{Source:
Lamb, S.E. et al. Group cognitive behavioural treatment for low-back pain in primary care: a randomised controlled trial and cost-effectiveness analysis. The Lancet, Early Online Publication, 26 February 2010}

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