Triceps is a muscle that makes up back of your arm. This muscle straightens the elbow. When you are doing push-ups, planks or just standing from a sitting position with pushing your arms, you are using this important muscle of your arm. Many times, people are so concentrating on biceps and that “v” look of arms, while building their muscles, they totally forgot this key muscle on the back of the arm. This causes muscle imbalances and invites a lot of pain as well as injury. So let’s talk about this crucial push-up muscle in this article. Continue reading “Triceps Strengthening : Exercises For The Back Muscle On Arm.”
Water Exercise: A Good Alternative to Exercise for Summer
ByWith the sun shining to its best, it is hard to survive in the gym for 30 or more minutes working out. The best alternative to exercise in these hot days is in the water. Water exercises are very effective, fun and produce great results. Moreover, water will not let you affect with the outside temperature. There are many benefits of working out in the water. Hydrotherapy or Aquatic therapy also has some great therapeutic benefits for orthopedic and neurological conditions. Here, I want to discuss a few important workout exercises that you can do in the pool or water.
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How to Perform Cervical Isometrics Exercises
ByCervical Isometrics can be a little tricky to perform by yourself. This makes it even more important to do these exercises correctly. It is always a good idea to connect with your physical therapist with any questions. Continue reading “How to Perform Cervical Isometrics Exercises”
Getting off the Floor – without hurting your knees.
ByIt is difficult to sit on the floor. It is even harder if you lose your balance and end up on the floor.. Or you happen to take some yoga classes or Jazz classes for entertainment. While practicing, you find yourself doing some cool moves on the floor. All that is fine, till you can do it or you are not hurting yourself. But the question comes, how to get up from this position, how to come back to an upright position, safely, without pain, without hurting joints??
This question is important particularly to people who have bad knees or hips, have arthritis, or have painful joints. The geriatric population also has difficulty getting off the floor due to age-related changes in flexibility and bony structures. Continue reading “Getting off the Floor – without hurting your knees.”
Plank: Why & Hows on this Famous Exercise
ByWhat is Plank?
Heard about this famous exercise? The plank exercise is many people’s go-to exercise to improve strength, agility, flexibility, endurance, weight loss etc.. Not only that, plank, done therapeutically helps improve core stability, reduce pain and improve posture.
The good thing is, the plank can be done in many different ways depending on a person’s ability. Adding a few variations here and there, you can personalize this very beneficial exercise to use it just for you. In addition, you can also vary the exercise to fit it in your schedule. You can perform a quick 5 or 15 minutes of plank workout and call it a day or choose to add this as a part of the strengthening exercise in your 45 to 60 minutes of workout routine. The choice is yours!! Continue reading “Plank: Why & Hows on this Famous Exercise”
Morning Back Pain : What to do before you head down to doctor’s office.
ByMorning back pain is common and can occur due to many different reasons. I have heard many people complaining of stiff back or painful back when they first get out of bed. This is a very generalized complaint. The reasons for a morning back pain varies from age, arthritis, posture to any history of back pain in the past. It may need a full physical therapy assessment in some cases. In contrast, in a few cases, it may be a matter of a small fix here and there. Continue reading “Morning Back Pain : What to do before you head down to doctor’s office.”
How to Perform Kegel Exercise: A Go To Exercise When Leaking Happens
ByKegel exercise is performed to strengthen and tone pelvic floor muscles. These are the internal muscles that are difficult to train by doing just regular pull-ups or weight training. Since these muscles control the movement of the bladder as well as bowel (too some an extent), exercising these muscles plays a vital role in the quality of life. It can be done by anybody at any age. Particularly it is more important for people who are pregnant or having incontinence issues. It is good for people who experience a few drops of leaking of urine while sneezing, laughing, or coughing, etc. Regardless of gender, this exercise is helpful in the treatment of urinary as well as fecal incontinence. Continue reading “How to Perform Kegel Exercise: A Go To Exercise When Leaking Happens”
Improving functional independence with Feeding Assistance
ByFeeding Assistance or making a person independent in feeding may not really seem like a physical therapy topic. Also, it is not that commonly encountered problem in orthopedic setting or high-level functioning individuals. Only until you start seeing patients with some neurological deficits or trauma. With my experience as a PT, one thing for sure is walking is an important aspect of independence but it is not the only aspect of functional independence. There are many tasks a person needs to do to perform his/her daily routine activities independently. Some of the examples of these are feeding, dressing, grooming, hygiene, moving in and out of bed, transferring on different surfaces and walking. You can add some more high-level activities like cooking, laundry, cleaning the house, grocery shopping and even driving but they are not really the basic tasks that a person will need to do on a daily basis. Continue reading “Improving functional independence with Feeding Assistance”
How to Perform Weight Loss Exercises Effectively
ByObesity can lead to many heart problems. Maintaining an ideal body weight not only aid in good health, but it also helps in improving self-confidence. There are thousands of videos and programs available on weight loss. Weight loss exercises have many health benefits. Depending on your goal, you can workout to improve strength, improve cardio fitness, improve flexibility, burn the body fat, manage weight or just relax your body. The aim of this article is to educate readers on developing a particular program that helps to lose body weight. I am not going to discuss specific exercises or recommend a product here in this article for weight loss. Rather, I want to keep this article open for readers to try to use whatever they can, wherever they can, to gain better health through exercises. Continue reading “How to Perform Weight Loss Exercises Effectively”
Five Pregnancy Exercises that an Expectant Mother Must Do.
ByCarrying a little angel within you is a delicate yet cherished time for every woman. Depending on age, and medical status, every woman reacts to changes in hormonal level and physical status differently. It is recommended from almost all medical sources that an expecting woman should try to be active as long as she can be. There are many benefits of exercising during these crucial nine months. Pregnancy exercises help to improve physical mobility, energy level and also helps increase psychological well being.
Being active, however, does not mean running a marathon, or participating in a triathlon (although there are some exceptions). Being on your feet, and performing your daily activities may sometimes feel like running an Olympic race. However, the 5 to 10 minutes of walking can help a woman and her baby to be healthy. In this article, I want to discuss five MUST do Pregnancy exercises for a pregnant woman. Remember, these are kind of mandatory for all woman but the list does not end with this.
Continue reading “Five Pregnancy Exercises that an Expectant Mother Must Do.”
How to Perform Shoulder Exercise Isometrically.
ByShoulder exercise is done with a wide range of variations. Isometric contractions are one of the ways to perform shoulder exercise. In my previous articles, I discussed how to perform isometric exercises of the elbow, wrist, knees, and low back. Isometric exercises are exercises that do not produce any visible body movements. The length of the muscle fibers does not change while performing this exercise. That is why these exercises are a good option to consider when a joint is in a cast or immobilized. They are also a good option to initiate your exercise protocol when a person demonstrates severe weakness or pain. Continue reading “How to Perform Shoulder Exercise Isometrically.”