Eldoa
Ease back pain with ELDOA for spinal decompression
Incorporating ELDOA postures into your daily routine can help you to rehabilitate an injury, off-set physical impacts of your job or improve your sports performance.
Back and joint pain is one of the most common complaints we see in the studio. It’s not surprising given that many of us are sitting for long periods of time, using devices that promote poor posture or doing physically demanding work or activities that our bodies may not be designed to do repeatedly. However, your options for resolving pain don’t have to be limited to surgery or long- term pain medication.
Your spine is a pretty impressive structure, sending energy and messages via a spinal cord, protected by a column of vertebrae, to control every function of your body. Between each vertebra in your back is a disc that cushions the bones, acting like a shock absorber. The thing is, all the pressures and poor posture our backs endure starts to compress these cushions, and starts to affect how those signals are transmitted through our body. These discs are over 80% water, so a dehydrated disc is a compressed disc! Because discs don’t have their own direct blood supply, they rely on movement to get rehydrated, and therefore, decompress.
A specialised technique – called ELDOA – that we use here at PostureFit actually encourages your spine to decompress, allowing you to regain that disc space and helping you to feel ease in your body again.
What is ELDOA?
Developed by Dr Guy Voyer, a pioneer of osteopathic medicine, ELDOA is a technique that actually addresses the root problem of back pain. Translated from French, ELDOA stands for longitudinal osteoarticular decoaptation. In other words: decompression of joints.
ELDOA postures strengthen, normalise and create space in joints. Through precise postures, we can create tension in the connective tissues in the body, known as fascia. Fascia allows us to stand, move and stabilise our body. Our aim with ELDOA is to bring the fascial lines within our body into tension. These unique and funky looking positions are not stretches, however they are self-normalising one- minute postures that localise tension to the level of a specific spinal segment, essentially by putting the spine or joint at the centre of ‘separating forces’ within the fascial chain. There is an ELDOA posture for every level of the spine from the base of the skull to the tailbone, as well as ribs, shoulders and hips. The intention is to create more ‘space’ in the joints, promote blood flow, and reduce the pressure on the discs. With this decompression, the discs are rehydrated and proprioception (knowing where you are in space) improves.
Who benefits from ELDOA?
Just about everyone can benefit from the use of ELDOA techniques, however it’s particularly beneficial for people who experience pain, discomfort, sciatica, back pain, neck pain, nerve pinching or disc problems. Through regular practice, ELDOA can help to improve the function of organs and limbs, blood flow and respiration. Over time, these skilled one-minute exercises also help to achieve postural strengthening, and therefore reduce discomfort or pain caused by repetitive use, poor posture or long periods of being sedentary. We see all sorts of people creating more ease in their bodies through ELDOA – from athletes and active sportspeople through to busy professionals and older folk who want to keep their bodies healthy and active for years to come.
