Few discomforts can be as debilitating as lower back and neck pain. Anyone who ever suffered from lower back pain (LBP) might have experienced that these types of pain are almost never restricted to ‘just’ the lower back. Discomforts that are often described as ‘pinges’, ‘pulls’, and ‘stabs’, and can evidently be felt anywhere between the knees and between the shoulder blades. These can be subtle or strong enough to render a person immobile for hours – even days.

Lower back pain is common, mostly because we have come to live a (too) sedentary lifestyle. When we sit we often sit incorrectly – slumped, cross-legged, or hunched. It’s not just how or when we sit; our choice of footwear is often also questionable.

The trouble with lower back pain is that it’s so easy to ‘get’. Yet, compared with many other ‘structural pains’, it can be extraordinarily hard to get rid of. We use our back constantly, even when we sleep. That’s not much different from neck pain. The trouble with neck pain is that it’s often associated with headaches, which in various strengths can persist for hours, days, or even weeks.

Improving our bodywork treatments

As we continued to receive more clients over the last twelve months we noticed a significant increase in bookings for lower back, upper back, neck, and shoulder treatments. With new clients we continued to respond to their bookings as we’ve always done. First, conduct a two-part Intake Assessment. Second, commence with a standardised practical session to further assess the client’s configuration and condition. Third, continue with a personalised treatment plan depending, of course, on the client’s interest in working with us. It is here where the ‘real’ learning starts, both for our client and ourselves.

What we created by following that three-step approach is a rather impressive library of notes taken from the sessions we completed over the last two years. Not only did we record how each client responded to the standard treatments. We also noted how we personalised their treatments, and the changes our clients reported on at next sessions. This ongoing process enabled us to improve our treatments considerably over the last two years.

Four amazing back and neck treatment tools

By becoming increasingly experienced with lower back and neck treatments we were able to continuously improve our treatment protocols. Eventually, this also helped us identify the methods and techniques that appeared to be most beneficial to clients and, following this, search for products that enabled us to deliver these methods and techniques more effectively. It took us ten months and hundred of product reviews to find four items that matched our requirements precisely.

Release Tool for Psoas Muscle, Back, and Hip Flexor

As the name suggests, this tool targets the psoas complex (hip flexors) which covers the lower lumbar region of the spine, the interior of the pelvis, and the femur (thigh bone). Because you engage your psoas when you lift your upper leg to your body the muscle and its connective tissues play an instrumental role in our mobility. Essentially, the psoas regulates our fight, flight, or freeze response; support our digestive organs; regulate our breathing, and aid in pumping blood and lymph through our body.
One of the amazing aspects of this tool is that it appears to be shaped as a therapist’s hand. It’s hardness is perfect to correct pain and dysfunction in the hip region. We fully agree with the manufacturer’s thinking: pressure – and only pressure – is what releases muscle tissue in the human body.

Despite its name and its original purpose we believe that we can use this tool to release tightness in nearly every muscle of the body, including hamstrings, thigh, inner thigh, calf, glutes, lower back, upper back, triceps, biceps, and chest. Ample experimentation lies ahead of us!

Release tool for deep tissues (back muscles)

We place demands on our spine constantly. It supports and stabilizes our head, and literally carries our arms, shoulders, and entire upper body. Without a spine we wouldn’t be able to stand up straight, walk, reach, bend, and twist. We need our spine for just about anything we do mechanically.

Muscles and connective tissues that become too tight around your spine can cause loss of mobility between its elements, the vertebrae. This usually affects your flexibility and ranges of motion. It can also lead to squeezed nerves, which enter and exit along the spine’s entire length, which can lead to many other issues.

This tool was specifically designed to target the muscles and connective tissues that surround and support the spine. By releasing these tissues, the spaces between the vertebrae are opened, which gives the nerves more room to function.

The tool has been trialed extensively as a means to combat (lower) back pain caused by aging, injury, and everyday movement. While it was originally designed for use on the lower back it can be used anywhere along the spine where tension, soreness, and pain is noticed. The simplicity of this tool’s appearance is deceptive. A considerable amount of research went into its development. We expect it to become a powerful addition to our practice tools.

Release tool for spinal curve realignment

If there’s one thing we work most on at Advaya it would be the optimisation of spinal curves. Many of our clients lost these as a consequence of normal aging, lack of sufficient movement and exercise, and unauthentic compensatory postures. Losing those curves even to a small degree can affect our mobility considerably and usually leads to other physical complications. This is where this tool comes into play. We will use it to help you release the muscle tissue and trigger points that surround your lower spine. It was purposely given a curved shape to specifically target a spine’s rotational ranges of motion.
Made of the same material as the other two tools, and designed on the same therapeutic principles in mind, we will use this tool to help you release muscular tension and to decompress and stretch the spine which provides relief for pinched nerves, herniated discs, and spinal stenosis.

Neck Muscle & Tension Release Tool

Whereas the other three products focus on releasing the muscles and connective tissues of the lower and mid sections of the spine, this one was specifically designed to treat hard to reach upper back and neck muscles. Its curve and ‘nodal’ design matches the form and configuration of your cervical spine precisely. This allows this tool to contact the exact areas where trigger points are most likely to be and develop.
The tool’s gentle curve props the cervical region of the spine up to provide traction and to create space between vertebrae. Tests show that this can provide immediate relief for clients who suffer from constant neck pain and consequent headaches. By pulling the head away from the neck, shoulder muscles are loosened. It also provides decompression and the correct anatomical position for the neck vertebrae and skull, thereby protecting the lower back from excess load and trauma.

We will use this tool to treat tension and stress in the head, neck, and shoulders related to headaches, migraines, TMJ, sinus pressure, vertigo, blurred vision, and clicks in the neck.

Perfecting Tool and Technique combinations

As with any other therapeutic tool, none of these items will ever fully replace or substitute the bodywork we perform manually. No tool can ever replace the sensitivity and intuition of our therapeutic hands, which are the critical enablers in the design and development of the personalised bodywork treatments for which we have become best known.

We believe that the purpose of any therapeutic tool is to provide treatment efficiencies and effectiveness that our human hands cannot provide. When tools such as these help us redefine the artistry that’s so intrinsically interwoven with the types of bodywork we provide, doors open to reveal new ways of learning and working. What matters most in all this is of course the relief you receive from our work, as well as the learning you receive about your own physical and emotional makeup. The tools that fulfil those requirements best often are the simplest.

We are very, very excited about the forthcoming arrival of these four ‘assistants’. As with any other new tool we will test them thoroughly over the next few weeks before we include them as standard items in our treatment protocols. I already sense that they are going to enhance our lower back and neck bodywork treatments significantly.