As soon as the hunchback is mentioned, many people will immediately think of the picture of the prime minister "Liu Luoguo". In fact, hunchback is a relatively common spinal deformation, which is a morphological change caused by kyphosis of the thoracic spine.
Normal people's spine is S-shaped from the side, with 4 physiological bends, namely cervical convexity, thoracic kyphosis, lumbar precociousness, and sacral kyphosis. When the physiological kyphosis of the thoracic spine becomes larger due to various reasons, a hunchback is formed.
Cause: Passive or active
The causes of hunchback can be roughly divided into two situations: passive and active. What is passive? Simply put, it is the thoracic kyphosis caused by the disease, and the individual can only passively accept this deformity. Common causes include ankylosing spondylitis, vitamin D deficiency (which can cause rickets in children and osteomalacia in adults), Schulman's disease (juvenile hunchback), mucopolysaccharides, and osteoporosis.
The other hunchback is called active or habitual, which is caused by personal reasons. For example, the student party that often lies on the desk to write homework, the office workers who sit still in the office, the low-headed people who love to play with mobile phones, and the people who drive. Mainly because of the poor posture usually, after sitting for a long time, you will subconsciously extend your neck forward, and the waist and abdomen will relax and move backwards, and the accumulation of time will lead to more and more hunchbacks on the back.
The hunchback wound temperament hurts the body even more
Hunchback with chest will make people look unspiritual and unsightly, but hunchback will not only make you lose your temperament, but also seriously endanger your health.
Hunchback will reduce the capacity of the chest cavity, causing a decrease in lung capacity and decreased exercise endurance; hunchback can easily lead to spinal deformities, compress nerves, causing lower back pain; hunchback causes tension in the head and neck and chest muscles, kyphosis, lumbar muscles are pulled, prone to strain; hunchback will affect digestive function, easy to cause bloating, constipation; hunchback will make the curvature of the cervical spine become smaller, and in severe cases, it can affect the vertebral arteries and sympathetic nerves, causing dizziness and headaches...
Correction belt becomes "net red"
There are many kinds of correction belts, but the principle is to improve posture through external force correction. Merchants will tell everyone that the correction belt can adjust the balance of strength of the muscles on both sides of the spine and maintain the normal state of the spine, so as to achieve the purpose of correcting scoliosis and correcting the chest hunchback. Some correction belts even add a lot of cool elements, such as intelligent monitoring, angle sensing, vibration reminders, etc., as if they have been cloaked in high-tech.
Judging from the comparison photos before and after the treatment of the correction belt provided by most manufacturers, the effect is very obvious. Especially for those student parties who often lie on the table to write homework, in the eyes of parents, the correction belt is simply an artifact to treat hunchbacks. For a time, many brands of corrective belts also became "net reds" for treating hunchbacks.
Correcting hunchback is unreliable
Hunchbacks are divided into passive and active types. Passive hunchback, such as ankylosing spondylitis and other diseases caused by the hunchback, the skeletal system of the spine has formed a stiff bony deformity, like a crooked neck tree that has grown for many years, even if the correction belt is used, it is difficult to correct the deformity, so it cannot be corrected. If you really want to correct it, you need to start from the cause, and often rely on surgery to complete it.
For active hunchbacks, because skeletal deformities have not yet formed in the spine, the main problem is muscle imbalance, so it belongs to the soft hump. It can be restored by adjusting the posture, and the use of correction at this time has a certain effect.
The longer you use it, the better
Since the correction belt can correct the active hunchback, is it not better to wear it for a longer time? The answer is no.
The movement of the spine in all directions is coordinated by multiple sets of muscles, such as when we do do dorsal extension, the muscles of the dorsal extension will contract, the flexors will relax, and vice versa. We must first understand a concept: the correction of posture requires active exercise to strengthen weak muscle groups, and passive stretching and relaxation of muscle groups with excessive force.
Long-term hunchback posture leads to imbalances in the flexor and extensors of the spine, and we need to strengthen weak dorsal extensors, such as erector, latissimus dorsi, trapezius, etc. Muscles are used in and out, and muscles are very "smart", once they can "save effort" will immediately "passive slack". If you wear a humpback correction belt for a long time, the dorsal extension of the spine is mainly maintained by the correction belt, and the muscles of the dorsal extension will be "unable to work", and muscle atrophy may occur over time. This leads to a situation where the child puts on the correction belt and straightens his back; the correction belt is removed and the back collapses again.
That is to say, the body is broken back to the correct position by external forces (correction belts), which does not mean that the weak muscles are exercised, and there is no relaxation effect on the tired muscles. Long-term wear, the opportunity for muscles to be exercised is less and less, but it is not conducive to spinal health. Corrective bands are only a way to treat the symptoms rather than the root causes. Correcting bad posture still depends on strengthening exercise and strengthening back muscles.
Scientific exercise can also correct hunchback
To introduce you to two very simple and effective corrective hunchback movements:
1. Flying swallow spreads its wings: hold hands together, place on the hips, head and neck back, straight waist and back extension. Slide your hands to the distal end and stretch your back as far as possible, feeling that your hands are against the back of your neck and waist, and hold it for 10 to 20 seconds.
2. Chair back extension: Sit upright in the office chair, relax your feet and shoulder width, stretch your arms back to hug the back of the chair, press your hips against the back of the chair, slowly push your chest forward, feel the tension of chest expansion and back contraction, and maintain for 10 to 20 seconds. Slowly return to the initial position, pause for a moment and repeat 10 to 15 times in turn.
Author: Wang Fengxian, deputy chief physician of the Department of Orthopedics, Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine
Review: Expert of the National Health Science Popularization Expert Database
Liu Peilai, chief physician of Qilu Hospital of Shandong University
Curator: Tan Jia
Editor: Wang Jianying