Episode 27 - Top 10 Gifts For A Healthy Spine
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Episode Summary
While the holiday season is known for evoking feelings of joy and merriment, we know that back pain can dampen even the most festive of spirits. That’s why we’re devoting this episode to our Top 10 Gift Ideas to promote a healthy spine. If you have a friend or family member struggling with back issues this holiday season, consider a gift that will help them stay active and pain-free in 2021.
With something on here for everyone’s price point, we hope these products can provide some value and relief to you or a loved one this holiday season. If you have a limited budget and really can only go for one of these things, Dr. Lakhia recommends the foam roller. It’s an incredibly useful tool that any physical therapist would likely recommend.
For more information about our sponsor, QxMD, visit qxmd.com, or email [email protected]. To try QxMD’s apps, download them on your device’s app store or follow these links: Calculate by QxMD, Read by QxMD, Learn by QxMD.
For more information on Dr. Sanjiv Lakhia’s practice, visit BackTalkDoc.com
Back Talk Doc is brought to you by Carolina Neurosurgery & Spine Associates, with offices in North and South Carolina. To learn more about Dr. Lakhia and treatment options for back and spine issues, go to backtalkdoc.com. To schedule an appointment with Carolina Neurosurgery & Spine Associates, you can call us at 1-800-344-6716 or visit our website at carolinaneurosurgery.com.
While the holiday season is known for evoking feelings of joy and merriment, we know that back pain can dampen even the most festive of spirits. That’s why we’re devoting this episode to our Top 10 Gift Ideas to promote a healthy spine. If you have a friend or family member struggling with back issues this holiday season, consider a gift that will help them stay active and pain-free in 2021.
- Traditional Medicinal Tea. Medicinal teas are available at most grocery stores, and many contain ingredients like ginger, turmeric, and meadowsweet that can reduce inflammation in the body and control or modulate your immune system. Dr. Lakhia’s favorite $5.79/box.
- Lumbar Support. Whether you suffer from back pain or not, we can all benefit from lumbar support. A lumbar support is a cushion intended to help create proper lordosis, or proper curvature, in your low back. You can use a lumbar in any of your chairs. Dr. Lakhia recommends the $30.
- Foam Roller. A foam roller is a cylindrical tool that you can use almost as a portable massage therapist. Placing it on the ground, you use the roller to target problem areas. A quick search on YouTube will return numerous exercise options. Dr. Lakhia recommends getting two sizes, a smaller one and a longer one, to target specific areas. Foam rollers are a cheap and critical tool to have in the toolbox as you battle any sort of back issue. Try the $23.
- Thera Cane. A Thera Cane is a handheld tool for self-treating myofascial trigger points and tender points in your back, hip, and pelvis. The Thera Cane’s design allows you to get leverage to address your pain points if no one is around to assist you. Dr. Lakhia recommends the $30.
- Trigger Point Manual. If you’re purchasing a Thera Cane, you will also want to pick up the Trigger Point Manual. It’s a patient education manual and it shows you where you can find all the trigger points. Trigger Point Therapy Workbook $20.
- HeartMath. HeartMath is a biofeedback tool that provides you with guided breathing exercises to help you develop what’s called heart and brain coherence, where the energy of your heart center can become in tune with the energy of your brain. The HeartMath tool takes you through daily breathing exercises. Over time, it can improve your heart rate variability, which means you’re lowering your stress and boosting your immune system and overall health. $120
- Venom Back Brace. The Venom brace is like a portable physical therapy gym, allowing you to treat yourself on the go with built-in deep heat and vibration. $199.
- Oura Ring. The Oura Ring is a premium sleep tracker that tracks your sleep time, sleep cycles, and helps you understand how your daily habits help or hinder your sleep. $299.
- HigherDOSE Infrared Sauna Blanket. With amethyst, tourmaline, and charcoal in the cover, the sauna blanket is going to heat you up, promote detoxification, and relax your muscles. It’s also incredibly portable and comes at a fraction of the price tag of a traditional sauna. () Dr. Lakhia cautions you to stay hydrated and replenish your electrolytes with coconut water or another natural, low-sugar beverage. $499.
- Original Mattress Company Orthopedic Ultra Plush Mattress. One of the top questions doctors receive about back pain is, “what mattress should I use?” This can be a hard question to answer because, like finding a good pair of shoes, mattresses are a highly personalized experience. What works wonders for one person may be awful for another. With that said, Dr. Lakhia recommends the Original Mattress Factory Orthopedic Ultra Plush Mattress. The mattresses are composed of high-quality materials, the prices are reasonable, and the company stands by its products. $600-$1300.
With something on here for everyone’s price point, we hope these products can provide some value and relief to you or a loved one this holiday season. If you have a limited budget and really can only go for one of these things, Dr. Lakhia recommends the foam roller. It’s an incredibly useful tool that any physical therapist would likely recommend.
For more information about our sponsor, QxMD, visit qxmd.com, or email [email protected]. To try QxMD’s apps, download them on your device’s app store or follow these links: Calculate by QxMD, Read by QxMD, Learn by QxMD.
For more information on Dr. Sanjiv Lakhia’s practice, visit BackTalkDoc.com
Back Talk Doc is brought to you by Carolina Neurosurgery & Spine Associates, with offices in North and South Carolina. To learn more about Dr. Lakhia and treatment options for back and spine issues, go to backtalkdoc.com. To schedule an appointment with Carolina Neurosurgery & Spine Associates, you can call us at 1-800-344-6716 or visit our website at carolinaneurosurgery.com.
Intro: 00:01
Welcome. You are listening to Back Talk Doc, where you'll find answers to some of the most common questions about back pain and spine health, brought to you by Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates, where providing personalized, highly-skilled and compassionate spine care has been our specialty for over 75 years. Now, it's time to understand the cause of back pain and learn about options to get you back on track. Here's your Back Talk Doc, Dr. Sanjiv Lakhia.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 00:32
Hello and thank you for tuning into this episode of Back Talk Doc. I hope everyone listening is having a wonderful holiday season. As we enter December, when I'm recording this episode, I think it's appropriate that we shift gears a little bit from a lot of the scientific talk to something more appropriate for the holiday season. Today, I'd like to go over my top 10 gift ideas to promote a healthy spine or top 10 gifts that you could give a friend or family member who maybe you know could be struggling with some back issues. These are products, many of them have actually tried myself as I've dealt with my own back issues through the years and even recently, and I might save this story for an episode down the road, but I've definitely vetted most of these or I'm receiving recommendations for them from either other physical therapists, physicians, or even from patients, because I learn a lot from you guys as well as we navigate the world of spine care. I know everyone's looking for an edge with a product or a device and a way to stay active and live without pain.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 01:52
This list is one that I've put together, and what I'm going to do here is I want to give you all options. We are going to have links to these products in the show notes, and just full disclosure, these are not affiliate links. I do not have any relationships with these companies. This is something for you to look at and make your own decision and there's no guarantees that these will work for you or be helpful. This is just a list that I think that, if you take a look at, you might find some benefit with. I'm going to list these in order of the least expensive to most expensive, that way there's something on this list for everyone's budget. I hope you find it to be valuable.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 02:31
Kicking it off, number one on my list would be Traditional Medicinals tea. Traditional Medicinals tea, they have a variety of basically it's herbal tea products, and you can get these from any grocery store. Typically, you'll find a whole list of products at the grocery store. One I like in particular is their Turmeric with Meadowsweet and Ginger. I get asked a lot, what is a nice, proven natural anti-inflammatory, perhaps an alternative to ibuprofen or NSAIDs. If you look at the medical research, there's a few that are out there, ginger fish oil, turmeric.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 03:13
It's really great to get it in your food and in your diet versus supplement, and I find drinking tea is a nice addition that you can have to your daily routine, in place of coffee even. Particularly if you're in pain, I think the caffeine and coffee, as well as the diuretic effect of coffee, could aggravate things, so drinking a little bit of the turmeric tea with ginger. Turmeric and ginger are both proven natural anti-inflammatories. They can reduce inflammation in the body and control or modulate your immune system. Having it in a tea form is excellent. You could get the Traditional Medicinals product line, their Turmeric with Meadowsweet and Ginger.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 03:53
Now, they also have other great products that are anti-inflammatory, like green tea is very anti-inflammatory and they have a straight up ginger tea as well, so either of these. Again, if you're in acute pain, drinking turmeric tea is not going to do anything for you, typically, but if you have this as part of your daily food plan, you'll be lowering inflammation over the long run.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 04:18
On a side note, one of the more popular alternate anti-inflammatory supplements in the market is the Infla-650. That is one of that's actually distributed out of South Carolina. That's Ayurvedic formula for which the main product in there that's anti-inflammatory is actually ginger. It's good to cook with ginger or get it in tea and with the Traditional Medicinals Turmeric with Meadowsweet and Ginger, you're going to get both, so that's number one on the list. You can get a box of the tea packets for about five bucks, great stocking stuffer for someone, or just buy some for yourself.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 04:57
Moving on, number two on my list. I think everyone with any sort of back condition, or frankly, even if you don't, would benefit from a lumbar support. A lumbar support is basically a cushion that can help create proper lordosis, or proper curvature, in your low back. You can use it with any chair that you're sitting in. A lot of the chairs that we sit in at the office or at home, they don't have a great support, or we just get fatigued from sitting for quite a while.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 05:29
The lumbar support product from Core Products, that's C-O-R-E, and we'll definitely link to it, I like this one because it actually has a bit of an air pump with it. You can control how much curvature you want to create in your low back. The reason I like that over the pre-formed lumbar support is that many people just have no curvature in her low back, no lordosis, and if you try to put them in a perfect posture from day one it can aggravate the back pain. This product gives you a little bit of control over that. You can pump it up a couple of times, and then over the course of a few weeks, you pump it up more as you reestablish your curve. It runs for about 30 bucks. We'll put a link to the product that you can get from Amazon. I think you'll find it to be very, very useful. You can also use it in the car when you're driving, long car rides over the holidays. It'll definitely give you some back pain relief.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 06:27
Moving on, number three on the list. If you talk to any physical therapist in our practice, they will advocate that everyone needs a foam roller. If you're not familiar with a foam roller, you should be. It's what it's described as, it's different sizes, a foam cylinder that has different stiffness or softness to it. It's a tool that you can use almost as a portable massage therapist. You put it on the ground, and if you just get online and YouTube foam roller exercises for low back pain, you'll see numerous.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 07:03
One of the best ways to use it is just to gently roll your hips, low back, and pelvis across the foam roller. It'll help work out a lot of the muscular kinks in your back. Additionally, you can use it to help mobilize your thoracic spine. You can do exercises on the foam roller. They come in different sizes and shapes. I encourage people to have at least two sizes, one's a long one and one's a smaller one, so you can target areas a little more specifically. A good foam roller, again, runs you about 30 bucks. We'll link to one that I like, but you also can pick it up on Dick's or Target, you can get them online. Very cheap and a critical tool to have in the toolbox as you battle any sort of back issue.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 07:47
Number four on my list is, really I think number four and five, it's kind of a combo pair, and that would be what's called a Thera Cane, along with a Trigger Point Manual. A Thera Cane, if you look this up, it's basically a plastic handheld tool that's shaped kind of like a question mark and it has different handles coming off of it. It is another way that you can do self-treatment for myofascial trigger points, myofascial tender points, in your back, hip, and pelvis. You can use this tool to basically get in there and massage out these points on your own. It is the way the Thera Cane is shaped that allows you to get leverage and really get into these points on your own if no one's around to help that.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 08:42
The Thera Cane is about 30 bucks, but you want to also purchase what's called The Trigger Point Manual, it's a patient-education manual and it shows you where you can find all the trigger points. Again, a trigger point, and we've covered this before in my episode on acupuncture versus dry needling, and certainly if you haven't heard that you should take a listen to that one, but a trigger point is where you have what's called a taught muscle band, it's where muscle fibers can retract and they don't release and they become really problematic and can refer pain in different areas.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 09:17
There are some common trigger points, for example, the gluteus minimus muscle, which is on the side of your hip. When you develop a trigger point in that muscle, it can mimic an S1 radiculopathy, which is radiating pain down the back of side of your leg, into the side of your calf. Working through that with your Thera Cane can be a very effective way to treat that. I think you'll find that combination, the Thera Cane and The Trigger Point Manual to be extremely useful and informative. Both of those run around 30 bucks each, and we'll link to those as well on Amazon.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 09:56
That leads us to number six on the list, now we're going to step up a little bit in price. I've talked a lot on this podcast about the role of stress in pain. We all know that when we're in a high-stress state from whatever it may be, and I mean let's just face it, 2020 for many has been a high-stress year, there's a pandemic, family, job concerns, economic concerns, election turmoil, it puts us all in a constant state of stress. When we're in stress, we have elevated stress hormone levels, like cortisol, which then can elevate our blood pressure and suppress our immune system. One of the tools in the toolbox to battle this is meditation. I would say an offshoot of meditation can be guided breath work. These are techniques that take us from a sympathetic stressed out state to a parasympathetic relaxed state. When you're in a more relaxed state, that is when your body can begin to heal.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 10:58
But meditation isn't for everyone. I mean, not every one of you out there is going to sit down in a dark room with a candle lit and do some chanting or try and focus and keep your mind still. You don't necessarily have to do that to get the benefits of meditation. The next item on my gift list is the HeartMath. The HeartMath is a wonderful sort of a biofeedback tool. It's evolved through the years. It used to be this little box, like a deck of cards, electronic box with an ear clip and you would look at lights and you would get biofeedback from it, but now it's evolved to the point where you can plug it into your iPhone and use their app.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 11:41
HeartMath essentially provides you with some guided breathing exercises and focus exercises to help you develop what's called heart and brain coherence. This is where the energy of your heart center can become in tune with the energy of your brain. These we know, through physiology and research, that there's a communication network that exists predominantly through your vagus nerve, but you can use that to your advantage through focused breathing at your heart center. You can lower your heart rate and improve what's called your heart rate variability, which is probably the premiere stress marker that we have right now. It deals with the variability between your heartbeats and the rate that they beat. Essentially, the higher the variability, the less stressed state you're in. You will go through daily breathing exercises with the HeartMath tool and over time you can improve your heart rate variability, which then means you're lowering your stress and boosting your immune system and overall health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 12:48
It's a wonderful well-researched back tool. Again, it's the HeartMath, at heartmath.com. I believe they're running a 20% discount special for the holidays. Wonderful tool if you're new to meditation, if you're new to this type of idea, don't go at it alone. I think you'll find this purchase to really pay big dividends for your health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 13:10
Moving on then, we are now at item number seven. Again, we're bumping up in price, the HeartMath is around 120 to 150 bucks. Number seven on the list is the Venom back brace, that's V-E-N-O-M, and this runs about 200 bucks. Now, I am not a back brace fan. In fact, I don't recommend back braces for people with back pain, but those are the braces that we're talking about that people try and use for back support and wear throughout the day. Back braces can weaken your core muscle system and just promote ongoing pain.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 13:49
The Venom back brace though is a therapeutic brace that you wear for treatment. Essentially what it is, it's a device that has built in deep heat and vibration. It's almost like a portable physical therapy gym. You get two modalities for the price of one. It gives you the option to treat yourself on the go. Very, very relaxing and therapeutic, used by professional athletes. You can find hyperized.com. They are well-known as well for some of their handheld massage tools, but the Venom back brace is a wonderful device just to give you some daily comfort and relief. Obviously, I'm a big advocate of therapeutic exercise, but I know sometimes you just hurt and you need something more than ice. If you have the ability and the resources to invest, this is a really, really wonderful device that can give you some immediate short-term relief.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 14:45
Moving on then, I want to transition just a little bit. Item eight on my list of top 10 gifts to promote a healthy spine is the Oura Ring. Now, the Oura Ring, that's O-U-R-A, I own an Oura Ring, I've talked as well on our episodes about the importance of sleep. If you hurt your back, you need time to heal, and really the only time your body heals and restores itself is during sleep, and in particular, the first part of sleep, which is your deep sleep. The deep sleep is when your body can really heal itself. It's important, I think, to have the ability nowadays to really track how you're doing. There's so many data tracking tools on the market and sleep, to me, we've said before, is the number one, I think, lever you can pull to improve your overall health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 15:43
If you're in pain, if you injured your back, you need to improve your sleep. The Oura Ring, it's wonderful. You basically wear it, it's like a ring, and you wear it and wear while you sleep and during the day. It's been shown to be almost as accurate as going for a medically-prescribed sleep study. You'll be able to wake up and see how much deep sleep you got at night, how much REM sleep you got at night and really see what interventions are helpful for your sleep and which ones are not helping your sleep. For example, with my Oura Ring, I know if I eat after 7:00 or if I have an alcoholic beverage after 7:00, it produces a elevator resting heart rate at night. Why is that important? Well, when your heart rate is elevated while you're sleeping, it's impairing your sleep and your recovery. Athletes know this and they use this data to really track their interventions.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 16:38
Also, in the time of stress and illness, you can see, do you have an elevated temperature at night, how's your respiratory rate, and these are really critical tools. The Oura Ring runs about 299. They do sometimes run specials over the holidays, something to check out. We'll put a link to the Oura Ring in the show notes, but it is a game changer if you're looking to improve your health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 17:00
Okay, we're flying through here. I want to move on now to item number nine on my list. Again, we're getting up in price. Now we're talking a little bit more money, but I love, love, love this item. I have myself a far infrared sauna, and we've had it for over 10 years. We've done a brief segment, I believe, on one of the early episodes, we can dig that out and link to it in the show notes, where we talk about High Tech Health and their far infrared sauna, but that's a standup sauna, it's a two-person sauna. I think that one runs around two to $3,000, but there is an alternative, and that is what's called the high-dose sauna blanket. We'll link to that as well. This runs about 499, and this is a wonderful alternative to the traditional saunas, provides the far infrared rays.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 17:55
Basically you lay in this blanket and you plug it in. The cover has amethyst with tourmaline and charcoal in it. This sauna is going to heat you up, it's going to promote detoxification, it's going to give you that runner's high. The deep heat from the sauna will really relax your back muscles. It's super portable, so you don't have to be stuck in the actual sauna in a box. Mine is in my basement, so when I'm in the sauna unfortunately I'm away from my family. Sometimes that's nice, just a little peace and quiet, but other times you just have to be away from it, and the sauna blanket is a nice alternative to that and certainly at a better price point for most people.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 18:36
It's something that I think if you can afford to have it in your toolbox, if you're an athlete or someone who suffers from joint pain, back pain, fibromyalgia, there's just terrific literature on the health benefits of sauna therapy. It's something that you do want to check with your physician about before you dive into routine sauna treatments. You do have to make sure you replenish your electrolytes, so something like having coconut water after you do your sauna, or you can make your own electrolyte fluid drink beverages. Try and avoid the commercialized sports beverages, like the Gatorade and the vitamin waters. These have a lot of artificial flavorings, a lot of sugar in them. But if you're going to do sauna treatments, make sure you're staying well hydrated and you get your mineral levels monitored as well. Having said that, it is just terrific for your muscles, it's terrific for your skin, your energy and your mood. Again, another potential game changer in your toolbox.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 19:35
All right, my friends hanging in there, I hope you found this list to be interesting. We're coming up on the last item for my top 10 gifts for a healthy spine this holiday season. This is one of the number one questions I get in the office. I'll tell you right up front, full disclosure, there's very little research to back this recommendation. In fact, there's very little research in the medical literature about this concept, but that is mattresses. I get asked a ton, what is the best mattress to sleep on if you have back pain? It can be a hard question to answer. Sometimes finding a good mattress, it's like finding a good pair of shoes. It's very personalized and what works for one may not work for another.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 20:18
The one I recommend to most people at least check out and try is the Orthopedic Mattress, in particular, the Orthopedic Plush Mattress, by Original Mattress Factory. Original Mattress Factory, they're well-known for their high-quality materials, their coils, the cushions, and just a general construction of the mattress. This one is going to lean on the firmer side. Actually, I have two of them in my house and we've had great success with it and my family members have used it when they visit.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 20:52
I like it for a couple of reasons. Number one, I think the company itself really stands by their products. Number two, the price point is far superior to some of these other mattresses on the market. It's typically around 800 to $1,000. It is a little firmer, which I think in general, people with back issues do better on a firmer surface than a very, very soft surface. The other thing is a lot of the Tempur-Pedic and memory foam mattresses, they off gas a lot of toxic chemicals, which are not very healthy for yourself. With those reasons in mind, I like this.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 21:29
Now, I advise anyone who buys a brand new mattress to really try and let it off gas. It's best to probably buy the mattress in the summertime. A lot of times it'll come wrapped in plastic, so what I do is we open the plastic up and we put the mattress in our garage for about a week, because in your garage, the temperatures can get really high and you can use that to your advantage and that can promote off gassing, accelerate the off gassing. There's a lot of chemicals in there that you really don't want to breathe in or touch. After about a week or so, then we bring our mattress in the house and it's certainly ready to go.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 22:05
The nice thing about Original Mattress Factory, I believe you can go and actually lay on the mattress in the store and try it out a little bit, but again, please don't hold me to this. This is my best attempt at a recommendation for a mattress. You very well could not like it, so you want to just take your time with these decisions and really do your own research.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 22:27
I hope you found this list to be helpful. I hope there's something on there for everyone's price point. If you have a friend or family member, or even yourself and you are struggling a little bit, I think these products could provide some value and potentially some relief. If you have just a limited budget and really can only go for one of these things, I would probably go after the foam roller. It's very, very useful. If you do any physical therapy, I think that therapist is going to recommend you buy one as well. There's numerous resources out there that you can look at and get terrific long-term value out of the foam roller. If you have any questions about that, feel free to reach out. I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season. Thanks for listening.
Outro: 23:12 Thank you for listening to this episode of Back Talk Doc, brought to you by Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates, with offices in North and South Carolina. If you'd like to learn more about Dr. Lakhia and treatment options for back issues, go to backtalkdoc.com. We look forward to having you join us for more insights about back pain and spine health on the next episode of Back Talk Doc. Additional information is also available at carolinaneurosurgery.com.
Welcome. You are listening to Back Talk Doc, where you'll find answers to some of the most common questions about back pain and spine health, brought to you by Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates, where providing personalized, highly-skilled and compassionate spine care has been our specialty for over 75 years. Now, it's time to understand the cause of back pain and learn about options to get you back on track. Here's your Back Talk Doc, Dr. Sanjiv Lakhia.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 00:32
Hello and thank you for tuning into this episode of Back Talk Doc. I hope everyone listening is having a wonderful holiday season. As we enter December, when I'm recording this episode, I think it's appropriate that we shift gears a little bit from a lot of the scientific talk to something more appropriate for the holiday season. Today, I'd like to go over my top 10 gift ideas to promote a healthy spine or top 10 gifts that you could give a friend or family member who maybe you know could be struggling with some back issues. These are products, many of them have actually tried myself as I've dealt with my own back issues through the years and even recently, and I might save this story for an episode down the road, but I've definitely vetted most of these or I'm receiving recommendations for them from either other physical therapists, physicians, or even from patients, because I learn a lot from you guys as well as we navigate the world of spine care. I know everyone's looking for an edge with a product or a device and a way to stay active and live without pain.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 01:52
This list is one that I've put together, and what I'm going to do here is I want to give you all options. We are going to have links to these products in the show notes, and just full disclosure, these are not affiliate links. I do not have any relationships with these companies. This is something for you to look at and make your own decision and there's no guarantees that these will work for you or be helpful. This is just a list that I think that, if you take a look at, you might find some benefit with. I'm going to list these in order of the least expensive to most expensive, that way there's something on this list for everyone's budget. I hope you find it to be valuable.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 02:31
Kicking it off, number one on my list would be Traditional Medicinals tea. Traditional Medicinals tea, they have a variety of basically it's herbal tea products, and you can get these from any grocery store. Typically, you'll find a whole list of products at the grocery store. One I like in particular is their Turmeric with Meadowsweet and Ginger. I get asked a lot, what is a nice, proven natural anti-inflammatory, perhaps an alternative to ibuprofen or NSAIDs. If you look at the medical research, there's a few that are out there, ginger fish oil, turmeric.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 03:13
It's really great to get it in your food and in your diet versus supplement, and I find drinking tea is a nice addition that you can have to your daily routine, in place of coffee even. Particularly if you're in pain, I think the caffeine and coffee, as well as the diuretic effect of coffee, could aggravate things, so drinking a little bit of the turmeric tea with ginger. Turmeric and ginger are both proven natural anti-inflammatories. They can reduce inflammation in the body and control or modulate your immune system. Having it in a tea form is excellent. You could get the Traditional Medicinals product line, their Turmeric with Meadowsweet and Ginger.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 03:53
Now, they also have other great products that are anti-inflammatory, like green tea is very anti-inflammatory and they have a straight up ginger tea as well, so either of these. Again, if you're in acute pain, drinking turmeric tea is not going to do anything for you, typically, but if you have this as part of your daily food plan, you'll be lowering inflammation over the long run.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 04:18
On a side note, one of the more popular alternate anti-inflammatory supplements in the market is the Infla-650. That is one of that's actually distributed out of South Carolina. That's Ayurvedic formula for which the main product in there that's anti-inflammatory is actually ginger. It's good to cook with ginger or get it in tea and with the Traditional Medicinals Turmeric with Meadowsweet and Ginger, you're going to get both, so that's number one on the list. You can get a box of the tea packets for about five bucks, great stocking stuffer for someone, or just buy some for yourself.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 04:57
Moving on, number two on my list. I think everyone with any sort of back condition, or frankly, even if you don't, would benefit from a lumbar support. A lumbar support is basically a cushion that can help create proper lordosis, or proper curvature, in your low back. You can use it with any chair that you're sitting in. A lot of the chairs that we sit in at the office or at home, they don't have a great support, or we just get fatigued from sitting for quite a while.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 05:29
The lumbar support product from Core Products, that's C-O-R-E, and we'll definitely link to it, I like this one because it actually has a bit of an air pump with it. You can control how much curvature you want to create in your low back. The reason I like that over the pre-formed lumbar support is that many people just have no curvature in her low back, no lordosis, and if you try to put them in a perfect posture from day one it can aggravate the back pain. This product gives you a little bit of control over that. You can pump it up a couple of times, and then over the course of a few weeks, you pump it up more as you reestablish your curve. It runs for about 30 bucks. We'll put a link to the product that you can get from Amazon. I think you'll find it to be very, very useful. You can also use it in the car when you're driving, long car rides over the holidays. It'll definitely give you some back pain relief.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 06:27
Moving on, number three on the list. If you talk to any physical therapist in our practice, they will advocate that everyone needs a foam roller. If you're not familiar with a foam roller, you should be. It's what it's described as, it's different sizes, a foam cylinder that has different stiffness or softness to it. It's a tool that you can use almost as a portable massage therapist. You put it on the ground, and if you just get online and YouTube foam roller exercises for low back pain, you'll see numerous.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 07:03
One of the best ways to use it is just to gently roll your hips, low back, and pelvis across the foam roller. It'll help work out a lot of the muscular kinks in your back. Additionally, you can use it to help mobilize your thoracic spine. You can do exercises on the foam roller. They come in different sizes and shapes. I encourage people to have at least two sizes, one's a long one and one's a smaller one, so you can target areas a little more specifically. A good foam roller, again, runs you about 30 bucks. We'll link to one that I like, but you also can pick it up on Dick's or Target, you can get them online. Very cheap and a critical tool to have in the toolbox as you battle any sort of back issue.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 07:47
Number four on my list is, really I think number four and five, it's kind of a combo pair, and that would be what's called a Thera Cane, along with a Trigger Point Manual. A Thera Cane, if you look this up, it's basically a plastic handheld tool that's shaped kind of like a question mark and it has different handles coming off of it. It is another way that you can do self-treatment for myofascial trigger points, myofascial tender points, in your back, hip, and pelvis. You can use this tool to basically get in there and massage out these points on your own. It is the way the Thera Cane is shaped that allows you to get leverage and really get into these points on your own if no one's around to help that.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 08:42
The Thera Cane is about 30 bucks, but you want to also purchase what's called The Trigger Point Manual, it's a patient-education manual and it shows you where you can find all the trigger points. Again, a trigger point, and we've covered this before in my episode on acupuncture versus dry needling, and certainly if you haven't heard that you should take a listen to that one, but a trigger point is where you have what's called a taught muscle band, it's where muscle fibers can retract and they don't release and they become really problematic and can refer pain in different areas.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 09:17
There are some common trigger points, for example, the gluteus minimus muscle, which is on the side of your hip. When you develop a trigger point in that muscle, it can mimic an S1 radiculopathy, which is radiating pain down the back of side of your leg, into the side of your calf. Working through that with your Thera Cane can be a very effective way to treat that. I think you'll find that combination, the Thera Cane and The Trigger Point Manual to be extremely useful and informative. Both of those run around 30 bucks each, and we'll link to those as well on Amazon.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 09:56
That leads us to number six on the list, now we're going to step up a little bit in price. I've talked a lot on this podcast about the role of stress in pain. We all know that when we're in a high-stress state from whatever it may be, and I mean let's just face it, 2020 for many has been a high-stress year, there's a pandemic, family, job concerns, economic concerns, election turmoil, it puts us all in a constant state of stress. When we're in stress, we have elevated stress hormone levels, like cortisol, which then can elevate our blood pressure and suppress our immune system. One of the tools in the toolbox to battle this is meditation. I would say an offshoot of meditation can be guided breath work. These are techniques that take us from a sympathetic stressed out state to a parasympathetic relaxed state. When you're in a more relaxed state, that is when your body can begin to heal.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 10:58
But meditation isn't for everyone. I mean, not every one of you out there is going to sit down in a dark room with a candle lit and do some chanting or try and focus and keep your mind still. You don't necessarily have to do that to get the benefits of meditation. The next item on my gift list is the HeartMath. The HeartMath is a wonderful sort of a biofeedback tool. It's evolved through the years. It used to be this little box, like a deck of cards, electronic box with an ear clip and you would look at lights and you would get biofeedback from it, but now it's evolved to the point where you can plug it into your iPhone and use their app.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 11:41
HeartMath essentially provides you with some guided breathing exercises and focus exercises to help you develop what's called heart and brain coherence. This is where the energy of your heart center can become in tune with the energy of your brain. These we know, through physiology and research, that there's a communication network that exists predominantly through your vagus nerve, but you can use that to your advantage through focused breathing at your heart center. You can lower your heart rate and improve what's called your heart rate variability, which is probably the premiere stress marker that we have right now. It deals with the variability between your heartbeats and the rate that they beat. Essentially, the higher the variability, the less stressed state you're in. You will go through daily breathing exercises with the HeartMath tool and over time you can improve your heart rate variability, which then means you're lowering your stress and boosting your immune system and overall health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 12:48
It's a wonderful well-researched back tool. Again, it's the HeartMath, at heartmath.com. I believe they're running a 20% discount special for the holidays. Wonderful tool if you're new to meditation, if you're new to this type of idea, don't go at it alone. I think you'll find this purchase to really pay big dividends for your health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 13:10
Moving on then, we are now at item number seven. Again, we're bumping up in price, the HeartMath is around 120 to 150 bucks. Number seven on the list is the Venom back brace, that's V-E-N-O-M, and this runs about 200 bucks. Now, I am not a back brace fan. In fact, I don't recommend back braces for people with back pain, but those are the braces that we're talking about that people try and use for back support and wear throughout the day. Back braces can weaken your core muscle system and just promote ongoing pain.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 13:49
The Venom back brace though is a therapeutic brace that you wear for treatment. Essentially what it is, it's a device that has built in deep heat and vibration. It's almost like a portable physical therapy gym. You get two modalities for the price of one. It gives you the option to treat yourself on the go. Very, very relaxing and therapeutic, used by professional athletes. You can find hyperized.com. They are well-known as well for some of their handheld massage tools, but the Venom back brace is a wonderful device just to give you some daily comfort and relief. Obviously, I'm a big advocate of therapeutic exercise, but I know sometimes you just hurt and you need something more than ice. If you have the ability and the resources to invest, this is a really, really wonderful device that can give you some immediate short-term relief.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 14:45
Moving on then, I want to transition just a little bit. Item eight on my list of top 10 gifts to promote a healthy spine is the Oura Ring. Now, the Oura Ring, that's O-U-R-A, I own an Oura Ring, I've talked as well on our episodes about the importance of sleep. If you hurt your back, you need time to heal, and really the only time your body heals and restores itself is during sleep, and in particular, the first part of sleep, which is your deep sleep. The deep sleep is when your body can really heal itself. It's important, I think, to have the ability nowadays to really track how you're doing. There's so many data tracking tools on the market and sleep, to me, we've said before, is the number one, I think, lever you can pull to improve your overall health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 15:43
If you're in pain, if you injured your back, you need to improve your sleep. The Oura Ring, it's wonderful. You basically wear it, it's like a ring, and you wear it and wear while you sleep and during the day. It's been shown to be almost as accurate as going for a medically-prescribed sleep study. You'll be able to wake up and see how much deep sleep you got at night, how much REM sleep you got at night and really see what interventions are helpful for your sleep and which ones are not helping your sleep. For example, with my Oura Ring, I know if I eat after 7:00 or if I have an alcoholic beverage after 7:00, it produces a elevator resting heart rate at night. Why is that important? Well, when your heart rate is elevated while you're sleeping, it's impairing your sleep and your recovery. Athletes know this and they use this data to really track their interventions.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 16:38
Also, in the time of stress and illness, you can see, do you have an elevated temperature at night, how's your respiratory rate, and these are really critical tools. The Oura Ring runs about 299. They do sometimes run specials over the holidays, something to check out. We'll put a link to the Oura Ring in the show notes, but it is a game changer if you're looking to improve your health.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 17:00
Okay, we're flying through here. I want to move on now to item number nine on my list. Again, we're getting up in price. Now we're talking a little bit more money, but I love, love, love this item. I have myself a far infrared sauna, and we've had it for over 10 years. We've done a brief segment, I believe, on one of the early episodes, we can dig that out and link to it in the show notes, where we talk about High Tech Health and their far infrared sauna, but that's a standup sauna, it's a two-person sauna. I think that one runs around two to $3,000, but there is an alternative, and that is what's called the high-dose sauna blanket. We'll link to that as well. This runs about 499, and this is a wonderful alternative to the traditional saunas, provides the far infrared rays.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 17:55
Basically you lay in this blanket and you plug it in. The cover has amethyst with tourmaline and charcoal in it. This sauna is going to heat you up, it's going to promote detoxification, it's going to give you that runner's high. The deep heat from the sauna will really relax your back muscles. It's super portable, so you don't have to be stuck in the actual sauna in a box. Mine is in my basement, so when I'm in the sauna unfortunately I'm away from my family. Sometimes that's nice, just a little peace and quiet, but other times you just have to be away from it, and the sauna blanket is a nice alternative to that and certainly at a better price point for most people.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 18:36
It's something that I think if you can afford to have it in your toolbox, if you're an athlete or someone who suffers from joint pain, back pain, fibromyalgia, there's just terrific literature on the health benefits of sauna therapy. It's something that you do want to check with your physician about before you dive into routine sauna treatments. You do have to make sure you replenish your electrolytes, so something like having coconut water after you do your sauna, or you can make your own electrolyte fluid drink beverages. Try and avoid the commercialized sports beverages, like the Gatorade and the vitamin waters. These have a lot of artificial flavorings, a lot of sugar in them. But if you're going to do sauna treatments, make sure you're staying well hydrated and you get your mineral levels monitored as well. Having said that, it is just terrific for your muscles, it's terrific for your skin, your energy and your mood. Again, another potential game changer in your toolbox.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 19:35
All right, my friends hanging in there, I hope you found this list to be interesting. We're coming up on the last item for my top 10 gifts for a healthy spine this holiday season. This is one of the number one questions I get in the office. I'll tell you right up front, full disclosure, there's very little research to back this recommendation. In fact, there's very little research in the medical literature about this concept, but that is mattresses. I get asked a ton, what is the best mattress to sleep on if you have back pain? It can be a hard question to answer. Sometimes finding a good mattress, it's like finding a good pair of shoes. It's very personalized and what works for one may not work for another.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 20:18
The one I recommend to most people at least check out and try is the Orthopedic Mattress, in particular, the Orthopedic Plush Mattress, by Original Mattress Factory. Original Mattress Factory, they're well-known for their high-quality materials, their coils, the cushions, and just a general construction of the mattress. This one is going to lean on the firmer side. Actually, I have two of them in my house and we've had great success with it and my family members have used it when they visit.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 20:52
I like it for a couple of reasons. Number one, I think the company itself really stands by their products. Number two, the price point is far superior to some of these other mattresses on the market. It's typically around 800 to $1,000. It is a little firmer, which I think in general, people with back issues do better on a firmer surface than a very, very soft surface. The other thing is a lot of the Tempur-Pedic and memory foam mattresses, they off gas a lot of toxic chemicals, which are not very healthy for yourself. With those reasons in mind, I like this.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 21:29
Now, I advise anyone who buys a brand new mattress to really try and let it off gas. It's best to probably buy the mattress in the summertime. A lot of times it'll come wrapped in plastic, so what I do is we open the plastic up and we put the mattress in our garage for about a week, because in your garage, the temperatures can get really high and you can use that to your advantage and that can promote off gassing, accelerate the off gassing. There's a lot of chemicals in there that you really don't want to breathe in or touch. After about a week or so, then we bring our mattress in the house and it's certainly ready to go.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 22:05
The nice thing about Original Mattress Factory, I believe you can go and actually lay on the mattress in the store and try it out a little bit, but again, please don't hold me to this. This is my best attempt at a recommendation for a mattress. You very well could not like it, so you want to just take your time with these decisions and really do your own research.
Sanjiv Lakhia: 22:27
I hope you found this list to be helpful. I hope there's something on there for everyone's price point. If you have a friend or family member, or even yourself and you are struggling a little bit, I think these products could provide some value and potentially some relief. If you have just a limited budget and really can only go for one of these things, I would probably go after the foam roller. It's very, very useful. If you do any physical therapy, I think that therapist is going to recommend you buy one as well. There's numerous resources out there that you can look at and get terrific long-term value out of the foam roller. If you have any questions about that, feel free to reach out. I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season. Thanks for listening.
Outro: 23:12 Thank you for listening to this episode of Back Talk Doc, brought to you by Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates, with offices in North and South Carolina. If you'd like to learn more about Dr. Lakhia and treatment options for back issues, go to backtalkdoc.com. We look forward to having you join us for more insights about back pain and spine health on the next episode of Back Talk Doc. Additional information is also available at carolinaneurosurgery.com.
