Listen to the experts: What did Dr. Zhao Hui say? Dr. Zhao Hui said, "The first thing to talk about is, of course, the spine, which is usually called" backbone ". The spine starts from the cervical vertebra and runs through the whole trunk of the human body, like our cervical vertebra and lumbar vertebra, which are all part of the spine.

If you are an office worker who often sits in an office, you must have such a problem: you often have neck pain or back pain, and it hurts very badly. Maybe you will also be curious: why is this? Is there any way to avoid it? This lecture, let's talk about this problem.

Walking upright+modern lifestyle

In the daily clinic, I found that many patients don't know the structure of the spine, and even often do some behaviors that damage the spine without knowing it. So here, we still have to make a brief introduction to the structure of the spine.

The spine is made up of a row of vertebrae arranged up and down. You can bend down and touch your back, and those bulges are pieces of vertebrae.

The shape of the vertebra is very special, with a hole in the middle. This arrangement will form a vertical pipe in the middle, which is called "spinal canal" in medicine. The nerves of the human body that control movement and sensation are hidden in the spinal canal. The instructions of the brain are transmitted to every corner of the body through the nerves here. You see, it is not an exaggeration to say that the spine is the "center" of the sports system.

In order to prevent these pieces of vertebral bodies from colliding and rubbing against each other, there is an elastic cartilage between two adjacent vertebrae, which is what we call "intervertebral disc". Note that the intervertebral disc we often talk about is actually a piece of cartilage. Intervertebral disc can change shape with external force, which is equivalent to a buffer device, and plays the role of bearing pressure and buffering vibration when we exercise.

Of course, in order to maintain the stability of the spine, there are naturally ligaments and muscles to provide support. In this way, the vertebrae, intervertebral discs, and the surrounding muscles and ligaments are closely coordinated, and our spine can operate efficiently.

It seems that the protection of the spine is quite in place and the structure is quite precise. Why is it still so prone to problems?

The direct reason, as you can surely imagine, is sedentary. When we sit still for a long time, especially when we work at our desk for a long time, the pressure on the cervical spine and lumbar spine is particularly great. Over time, problems will naturally occur. This is easy to understand.

This reason is very important, but it is a bit too superficial. We "get" the user's field of vision, which is definitely not limited to this. If we look at this problem from the perspective of human evolution, we will get a more fundamental conclusion-

There is a huge BUG in the structure of human spine, which is naturally easy to be damaged.

As we all know, people evolved from reptiles. From crawling on the ground to walking upright, in this evolution process, our spine has also undergone tremendous changes.

You can imagine:

When the limbs touch the ground, the pressure of the body is mainly concentrated on the limbs, and the pressure on the spine is very small, so it is naturally not easy to be injured. But after humans learned to walk upright, the direction of stress changed-a large part of the body weight fell on the spine, and the pressure on the spine increased greatly. In other words, compared with reptiles, the human spine works under high pressure all the time, and injuries are inevitable.

Now you should understand. Why are our spines, especially the cervical and lumbar vertebrae, so prone to problems? This has to be understood from two aspects:

On the one hand, the change from landing on all fours to walking upright greatly increases the pressure on the spine. This is the root cause. On the other hand, the modern lifestyle of sedentary and often sitting at a desk has aggravated the burden on the spine, making it prone to chronic diseases.

You can see the result of the superposition of these two factors-almost every office worker has a problem with his spine and suffers from neck pain and back pain.

Formation process of spinal lesions

Understand this truth, and then look back at the causes of neck and shoulder pain and lumbar disc herniation, it is easier. Can you imagine what changes have taken place in the spine when we sit still for a long time?

Muscles—

In order to maintain the posture of "sitting", our waist muscles need to be kept tight all the time, and there is no rest for a moment. Over time, it is easy to strain.

Look at the cervical vertebrae. Whether sitting reading or writing, watching computer or playing mobile phone, we usually keep our heads down and stare at the same goal. In order to maintain the stability of the head and neck, the muscles of the neck should be kept tight at all times, so it is easy to strain.

We often hear "lumbar muscle strain" and "neck and shoulder strain", which are essentially caused by muscle overwork for a long time and lack of rest.

Intervertebral disc—

When sitting for a long time, the load on the cervical and lumbar vertebrae increases, and the pressure on the nearby intervertebral discs will naturally increase. And the curved spine will squeeze the intervertebral disc, making the stress on the intervertebral disc very uneven. With more stress and less stress, the intervertebral disc is easily crushed. You can think of it as a crushed jelly. At this time, if the intervertebral disc is given some rest time, it can recover its elasticity.

However, if the pressure has not been relieved, the intervertebral disc is really "too tired" and cannot be recovered. On the contrary, it will swell out, that is, make itself bigger to release the internal pressure. At the same time, osteophytes, that is, "bone spurs", will grow on the edge of the vertebrae to maintain the balance of the spine.

If the pressure continues, the intervertebral disc will not only be flattened, but even burst. At this time, things are serious-

On the one hand, the cushion between vertebrae disappears, and the task of maintaining the normal curvature of the spine is all on the surrounding muscles. The muscle load is further aggravated, which will aggravate the strain and cause more severe pain. On the other hand, after the disc ruptures, the tissue inside will leak. Once the leaked tissue enters the spinal canal and compresses the nerves inside, it will cause severe pain.

This is what we often call "disc herniation".

This process is the "imbalance-compensation-re-imbalance" we talked about earlier-

Take the intervertebral disc for example, if you sit still for a long time, the intervertebral disc in the cervical and lumbar vertebrae will be squashed and its function will be greatly reduced. In other words, the four elements of the sports system have been "unbalanced". In order to ensure the normal operation of the motor system, the intervertebral disc will swell to release the pressure, and the vertebrae will also produce bone spurs, thus continuing to maintain the stability of the spine. At this time, it has entered the "compensation" link. If the intervertebral disc continues to be squeezed, it will eventually rupture, causing lumbar disc herniation and entering an irreversible "re-imbalance" link.

How do orthopedic surgeons solve it?

How do orthopedic surgeons deal with diseases such as lumbar muscle strain and lumbar disc herniation? In other words, if we unfortunately encounter these problems, how can we receive treatment?

The answer, as we have said, is to rebuild the balance of the four elements. The first thing the orthopedic surgeon does is to judge which factor the pain comes from, and then solve the problem-

If the pain simply comes from muscle strain, then taking anti-inflammatory and analgesic drugs with proper rest, local hot compress and massage can solve the problem. It is worth noting that repeated strain of the same part must be avoided, otherwise the repair process will become very long.

If there are irreversible changes such as disc rupture, minimally invasive surgery can be considered in the early stage to clean up the leaked tissue of the disc and relieve the compression on the nerve. This operation has been popularized for many years and is very mature, so you can do it with confidence.

If the condition is very serious and the spine has been severely deformed, such as scoliosis and cervical kyphosis, besides the treatment of muscle strain, internal fixation should also be considered, such as fixing the vertebrae with steel nails to help the spine return to normal physiological curvature and re-establish the balance of the four elements.

A list of suggestions for busy people

Of course, everyone doesn't want to get sick at last and have to go to the doctor. Therefore, in daily life, it is still necessary to prevent problems before they happen. The following simple suggestions can help you take care of your spine in your busy schedule.

1. Avoid sitting for a long time, and try to reduce long-term work at your desk.

Looking for opportunities to stand more and lie down and rest will reduce the burden on the spine. From this point of view, lifting the desk is a good choice.

2. Even if you have to sit at your desk for a long time, you should increase the rest time in the middle.

Every 45 minutes to 1 hour, stand up and move. Doing interval exercises, writing rice exercises with your head and turning your waist and hips can relax your muscles and recharge your spine.

3. Strengthen the muscle training of neck and waist.

The stronger the muscles here, the more they can share the pressure and protect our spine. Recommend the action of "Little Swallow", there are videos on the Internet. At the beginning, you can do 10-20, and gradually increase it to 30-50. At the same time, swimming is also very useful for exercising the muscles of the back.

4. Massage can cure the symptoms but not the root cause. If you want to do it, you must find a regular technician.

Massage is mainly through manual stimulation to relax muscles and accelerate local blood circulation, thus relieving pain. It is really effective in the short term, but if the behavior that causes muscle strain is not fundamentally eliminated, muscles will still be damaged.

It should be noted that some irregular so-called "bonesetting massage" is very risky, especially for patients with severe disc herniation, which will not only aggravate the condition, but also lead to paralysis. So if you must massage, please be sure to find a regular technician.

One more word: more practical suggestions and treatment schemes for common diseases such as cervical spondylosis and lumbar disc herniation. I will give you a more detailed explanation in the form of special lectures in the future. It won't be expanded here.

Thinking questions

When you get up in the morning, people's height is generally higher than that at night 1-2 cm. Can you explain this phenomenon with the knowledge of this lecture? If you think of it, please write down your answer in the message area.

If you have relatives and friends who suffer from spinal injuries, please care about them and share the contents of this lecture.