♪ Bob and Brad, the two most famous ♪ ♪ Physical therapists on the internet ♪ (Bob claps) - Hi folks, I'm Bob
Shrupp, physical therapist. - Brad Heineck, physical therapist. - Together we are the most
famous physical therapists on the internet. - In our opinion, of course, Bob. - Today, we're gonna talk
about three best stretches to quickly remedy lumbar spinal
stenosis and avoid surgery. - That's right, Bob. - So who do we know, Brad,
that's having trouble with this? Well, Bob, this truly happens too. By the way, this is not uncommon, particularly with people
past 50 years old. And we'll get into that a little bit. - By the way, if you're
new to our channel, please take a second to subscribe to us. We provide videos on how to stay healthy, fit, pain-free, and we upload every day. Do we know what we're
giving away, by the way? Someone tell us. Well, go to bobandbrad.com. What? Oh.
- Sleep. A bed. A nice bed.
- Wow. We're giving away a bed. Go to bobandbrad.com. Go
to the giveaway section. We're actually given
away an entire mattress. - That's right. - A SleepOvation mattress,
700 tiny mattresses in there. The most comfortable mattress.
Brad, you can attest to this. - I certainly can. - You got back pain, and you love it. - We both do. - Oh, yeah. - I mean, separate beds, of course. - Yeah.
(both laugh) You can go to Facebook. It'll also be pinned to the
top of the page, the contest. Go to Twitter, Instagram, or TikTok if you want a 60 second
version of our program. - Watch this. (cardboard plops) All right, so spinal stenosis... In this case, lumbar. So, you can have stenosis throughout your whole spine.
- Yeah, you can have in your cervicals, in the neck. - And stenosis, technically,
if you look at it, it just means a narrowing. - Right. - A hole. - The hole was like
this. Now it's like this. - So you can have
stenosis of your arteries or your veins.
- Sure, yeah. - So we're talking about... We'll, look at this. I don't have my little pointer here. But here, if we look at the spine, and we're talking about lumbar stenosis. We're talking about the low back. And if you look at spinal stenosis, there's two areas of stenosis that can cause pain in your back and going down into one
or both of your legs. And we look right here. Can you zoom in on this, Tanner? With this nerve... Here we got a nerve coming up, peripheral nerve we'll call that, which does go down into your leg. Now, the gap right here
is called the foramen. That actually starts to close up. It may be because your disc, as aging process is deteriorating, which pretty much happens in everyone, or it could be some bony- - [Bob] Overgrowth. - [Brad] Overgrowth. - Arthritis getting started.
- [Brad] Calcification going. One way or another, but the nerve gets pinched because the hole that it
goes through becomes smaller or stenotic. That can also happen with the spinal cord. It's hard to show in here, but if you look at the- - [Bob] Yeah, in the
spinal canal, you can- - [Brad} There you go, Bob, that's right. - [Bob] Right here, Brad,
you can kind of show it. - [Brad] There you go. Yep, in here. But it happens more often lower.
- Oh, lower, right. - [Brad] When that happens, oftentimes, the pain or
the symptoms will go down both legs.
- Both legs, yes. - One way or another, there
is, worst case scenario, surgery, that typically
typically can help it out. However, I found out after
doing a little research that most of the time,
vast majority of time- - Right, vast majority. - you don't need surgery. - Right. - So that's good news. - Because it can get inflamed. And once the inflammation calms down, it has enough room then. - Yeah. - But with the inflammation, there is not. - Right. - And also certain movements can be done. - Right, and that's what we're gonna do is show you exercises that increase that gap and make it even more, a less chance yet of having surgery. So we gotta get rid of the spine here. I'm back now. So let's go into... There's a five question self-test- - Oh, yeah, that's right. - that can take for this. It's not a definitive test, but it'll help give you... If four of these answers
are yes out of the five, there's a pretty good
chance you have stenosis. - Spinal stenosis, right? - Right. So the first one, if you have bilateral or pain or symptoms
down both of your legs, if that's a yes, then
you've just put a yes down. - Right. You're definitely... - Well, there could be
other things, but yeah. And as again, as all these combine. Number two, if more leg
pain than back pain. So if you got... And sometimes its leg pain because it feels like a toothache, a numbness, a tingling,
all those symptoms. If you have more down the leg, one leg or both legs and not
so much up here, that's a yes. If that's the case,
you'd check that one off. Number three, if pain gets
better, when you sit down. - Yes. - And I've had lots of
patients, including myself, boy, you sit down and within... not hours, but within a minute or so, it's like, "Oh."
- Yeah. Sometimes right away.
- Yeah, it's a big relief. - Yeah. Number four- - You missed number three, Brad. Pain with standing or walking. - Oh, yeah. How could I miss that one? Very typical, people find when- - Standing straight. - Yep, standing up straight. Or like if you're walking-
- Walking straight. - if you were shopping, you
hold onto the grocery cart, and you find that leaning forward onto the cart feels better. - That's a dead ringer there. I'll tell you... Well, they call it shopping
cart syndrome actually, because you actually feel
better when you're walking with the shopping cart. - And then if you are older than 48... Now we've had, Bob, that's
something older than 55. Whatever, if you get up
into your fifties or older, there's a more chance that it's gonna happen.
- Yeah, I saw if you're older then
55, and if you did this, you go up like this, and that
would increase your pain? - Sure. - That was spinal stenosis because you're closing up the gaps there. - So there's different
information out there, but of those five questions, if four of them are positive or yes, there's a fairly good
chance you have stenosis. So the other thing is if
you're having leg symptoms on one or both legs, and
it sounded like stenosis, and you're having problems
with your balance, or you've had a history of falls, you need to go see a doctor. Don't go through this and try and fix it. You need to see a... If you're falling, figure
out what's going on; and you have these symptoms,
get it checked out. And then maybe see a therapist directly. Cause that's getting more serious. - Right? - So if you're having these symptoms, but you feel functional, and you sit down, and it feels better, here's one of the stretches. We've got three stretches to do. These are relatively easy. Particularly, this first set. You can do these in your bed
before you get out of bed. If you can lay down on
a floor, carpeted floor, that's a good option as well. The first one is just start
with a single knee to the chest. Oftentimes, if it's the right leg that feels the pain
going down just one leg, that leg going up by
itself may feel better. In my case right now, oh,
yeah, that feels better. Make sure you do both legs. And it may take both. And we do suggest do both knees coming up cause that helps open those
gaps up on both sides. You got anything more about this, Bob? - No, that looks good to me. - You can hold this 15 to 30 seconds depending on how it feels. If it feels better to get motion and go pressure on, pressure off, 10 repetitions is probably good. - Again, this should feel good, though. If this is causing increased
pain, you're stopping. - Right. There's something else- - Or even increased pain afterwards. - Right, you do 10, and it feels okay, or a little bit better, but then you get up- - And it's actually worse. - And you're getting worse, and over the next half following, you've flared it up. - Yeah. - So yeah, be really aware
of how things respond after the exercise. So if those help, and
they stay good afterwards, you can do those three
times a day, I'd recommend. - Sure. - Or possibly more, as long
as it continues to feel good. The next one, the six inch roll. Now, this one I learned
taking a continuing ed class. - He's got a foam roller. - Yep. So this one you
need to do on a floor. You're not gonna do it
in your bed, for sure. - Yeah, you need a firm surface. - Yeah, carpeted floor. I would not try it on a smooth floor. You could do a rolled up towel
that was rolled up tight. - Really? Yeah. - But these work a lot better. Now, what you're gonna
do with a foam roller... It works better if it's
a little bit softer. They have a lower density, but even a hard one that's usually... They're black and color, they're a little more firm. That'll work. This is a
little more comfortable. You put it down below your
belt line under the sacrum, the lower part of the sacrum. Not down in here where it
feels like it's gonna fall off. - So the sacrum is a
triangle right about here. - Yep. - So that can kind of give you a little bit of a hint
of where the location is. - So you'll go like this, and you'll know it's in the right spot cause it's gonna feel good for one thing. And if it feels like it's
falling off like that, you need to bring it
in a little bit closer, not much, a half inch or so. And this... Though, what happens is
a roll kind of helps gap those facets or those foramen. - Sure. - And if you push a little
bit like this and roll it, and actually, what I do is... I'm gonna expose a little
bit of myself here. I'm gonna go right on my skin cause it grabs a hold of the skin, and that actually feels good. It kind of gaps. - Sure. - It pulls the foramen apart. - Almost like a little traction there. - Yep, exactly. Right, Bob, yep. And you're gonna do that... Like right now, this
is feeling really good, and I could do this for
about 30 seconds easily until I get tired. You're gonna work with
that for a few minutes. Do that a few times a day. Now, this next exercise, number three, it's gonna take a little bit of... Not special equipment, but a pull up bar. We're gonna use the hanging handles, but pull a bar that... And you're gonna actually
put some traction through your back by hanging. This is no new science or anything. It's been around for a long time. There's one thing I've found. I haven't seen this anywhere. - I haven't really seen it, Brad. - But I know it works for me, so. - I thought this was a cool idea. - So first of all, if you
have a pull up bar, grab that. If you have hanging handles,
it works better yet. It works good to be up against the wall. - Up against the wall. And plus if you have the hanging handles, you can keep your feet on the ground. - Yep. Yeah, you don't
wanna have something you have to jump up to get. - Yeah. - So here and then you slowly go down. - And you still can have some weight through the feet if you want. - Yep. - And then if you want, you can progress to no weight. - Yeah. And assuming your
shoulders tolerate this. Typically, it's good for your shoulders if you got reasonably... - Right. - And that's a whole another
topic we've got videos on, but I can actually do this. But the key part about
this is you have to be able to relax your core muscles because they're gonna allow the spine to get that traction and
open up those foramen. - Yeah, if they're tightening up, you're not actually getting any traction. - Right. If you're going ( Brad grunts) and you're all tight, it's not gonna work. You need to relax. Let everything relax. Now, what I found is if
I put my feet right here and that actually lets me relax better, and it flexes the spine just
like the previous exercise. - See, what happens if you're hanging, and you're having to lift the legs, those muscles are tightening
up and pulling on the spine. - Yep, exactly. - So this is relaxing
the muscles of the legs. - Mm hmm, yeah. - And relaxing the stomach and abdomen, and you can just let it hang. - Yep. - It's a brilliant idea, Brad. - And I can do a little of this. Or I can go up to this level. At home, I've done it. I don't have a stool like this. - Just make sure you got enough
strength to hold on to it because you don't wanna end up falling. - Yeah, absolutely.
- And landing on your butt. - This is not one to do if you're concerned about that at all. You need to feel confident in hanging. - In hanging, right. - Yep. So I typically only hang 20
to 30 seconds at the most. When my fingers are
starting to become tired, I don't even try to push it. - So what do you call it,
the Heineck hanging method? - Yeah, the Heineck maneuver. - The Heineck maneuver. (chuckles) - Not to be confused with the Heimlich maneuver.
- Not the Heimlich. The Heineck maneuver. - Right. - There we go. - I do feel... It feels good now. I've got spinal stenosis, by the way, so that's why I have at this young age, well, I guess, I'm 68 now. (Bob laughs) But I had this when I was younger. - Young age? - Well, you know, I'm trying
to be optimistic, Bob. - You're trying to find some
dirt that says older viewer. (Brad laughs) - Why, Bob? Why? - By the way, if you're
new to our channel, you've gotta... Will we do that part yet? I was gonna say- - Talk about age. - we could fix just about everything. - Except for- - A broken heart. - That's right, Bob. The hanging isn't gonna do anything for it.
- All right. (both laugh) Thanks. - Be careful.
