Exercises To Help Painful Sciatica Symptoms

spinal stenosis

Sciatica refers to an often painful condition where the sciatic nerve is being pushed on, is under pressure or damaged. The sciatic nerve is the largest nerve in the body, running from the base of the spine, through the hip and knee to the ankle. Thus problems with this nerve can be painful and uncomfortable and can affect the whole leg, hip joint and lower back. Sciatica exercises can help to ease this pain, as well as help with the causes of sciatica.

There are many sciatica exercises available to stretch the legs as well as build and strengthen the muscles around the sciatic nerve. These will help to take daily pressure off the sciatic nerve. Hamstring muscles, running along the back of the leg can often become tight as well shorten, especially if one does a lot of exercise like running or cycling. Sciatica exercises that target the hamstring by loosening and lengthening the muscle will help ease any pressure on the sciatic nerve. One of these stretches involves lying on your back and putting your one leg straight up and holding a towel or a band around your foot. Gently pull your toes toward your chest, keeping your leg straight. Other sciatic exercises that strengthen your thigh muscles also relieve sciatic pain by taking pressure off the nerve. Increasing the amount of exercises you do laterally like side squats, can also help to work the muscles that often aren't used regularly such as the gluteual muscles. Strengthening these muscles will offer extra support to the sciatic nerve and the whole body.

The lower back is often responsible for sciatica, so sciatica exercises targeting the lower back can relieve tenderness caused by sciatica. One example of these exercises is the pelvic tilt, which involves lying on your back and gently lifting your pelvis off the floor. Exercises that also stretch the back can be used as a way to decompress the spine so that there is more space between the spinal bones or vertebrae. The core of the body also plays a crucial role in supporting the back so exercises that work the core muscles in the stomach, such as pilates exercises can help alleviate the painful symptoms of sciatica.

However the most crucial thing to remember when doing sciatica exercises is that sciatica can be caused by a variety of factors. Therefore a physician should always be consulted, as well as possibly a physical therapist to clarify what the cause of the sciatica is and that the exercises are indeed alleviating the problem, not making it worse.

Sciatica can be caused by a number of things including piriformis syndrome, a herniated or slipped disk, spondylolisthesis, spinal stenosis, tumors, osteoporosis or even pregnancy. In most of these cases, sciatica exercises can indeed help to relieve the pain. In the case of piriformis syndrome, sciatic exercises that work deep into the hip joint, loosening the piriformis muscle and strengthening the surrounding gluteal muscles, will help to take strain off the sciatic nerve. In the case of spondylolisthesis and a herniated or slipped disk, strengthening the lower back muscles by doing sciatic exercises such as the pelvic tilt will help to make the back stronger so it can support the area that has suffered some damage. This again will take the pressure off the sciatic nerve. Stretching the back to make space between the vertebrae will also help in cases like spondylolisthesis and spinal stenosis.

Sciatic exercises need to be done regularly in order to see permanent results and fight off the pain that accompanies sciatica for good. Physical therapists and a routine of exercises can help to keep up motivation levels, ensuring that the exercises do what they need to do to keep sciatica at bay.