hey everybody, it's doctor jo and today i'm going to show you how to use an inversion table to relieve back pain. so let's get started. so the folks at teeter sent me their fitspine lx9 inversion table, but i'm going to talk about it a little bit more later. let's just talk about inversion tables in general. a lot of you all ask me all the time: are inversion tables good? are they bad? are they worth it? and there is a lot of research that shows that inversion tables really do help relieve back pain. and the reason the inversion inversion tables help is because they're relieving the pressure in the spine. and so a lot of times when you have back issues like a pinched nerve, herniated disc, maybe even stenosis in your back, or degeneration in your back, when it opens up the spine, those vertebrae, those spaces in the spine, it will help relieve the pain. there are a couple things with inversion tables precautions that you should know about. there are things like if you have high blood pressure, if you have maybe something like glaucoma, a fracture, maybe even a spinal surgery in the past. you want to make sure there are definitely some precautions because you're inverting, if you have circulation issues, you know all that blood is kind of flowing to your head. so you really want to make sure that you don't have any of the precautions, you're cleared by your doctor or your physical therapist to make sure that they're okay to use. so what's really neat about inversion tables is one, they're a pretty affordable way to get that traction. so traction in general is what you're getting, the the inversion tables, that benefit of the traction. there's other ways that you can do it. you often see in a clinic they might have machines um that are actually automated with pulling and giving you that traction. that's helpful but those are really really expensive. so this is a way to be able to do it at home. with inversion tables, there's a couple of things that you want to make sure that you know about before which is number one, making sure that they're safe, two the comfort level of them, and then making sure that it's something again that's just right for you because inversion tables aren't right for everybody. so the fit spine is super smooth. when you're when you're on it, it's not jerky. it's not um you know jostling you around. it's a nice smooth movement. it also has an easy angle tether and this allows you to easily preset your inversion angle to 20 which is the green mark, 40 which is the orange mark, or 60 which is the red mark, and then you can unlock it to go completely to 90. you always want to start off with a little bit. if you if you really familiar with the inversion table and you've been doing it for a while, and your body has adjusted, you could go to the 90, but don't start off with that. start off with that green and in general usually just starting off with one to two minutes. again talk to your doctor, talk to your therapist about what's going to work for you, but this is just like any exercise program. you don't want to go all out because then you might end up sore, and then you don't want to do it anymore. it's also like any exercise program or home exercise program your therapist gives you where you have to be consistent using it. this traction, a lot of people who don't like traction machines or are against it per se, will say well it's just temporary relief. it's opening up those spaces for a short period of time. but if you do it consistently, then that's what's going to help. you wouldn't just do stretches one time and expect to be better. you have to do the stretches you know continuously. make it a maintenance program if you have a specific injury. so it's the same thing with this. it's not going to be, you do it one time and you feel 100 better. you might, but that's not always going to be the case. just like with a stretch sometimes you feel immediately better the first time, but a lot of times you have to do it consistently for a period of several weeks over, you know, months to really get it consistently feeling better. so i'm going to hop on this and show you a little bit more about the specific teeter benefits of this particular inversion table. so one of the first ones is with the ankle lock system down there. it has a long lever arm, so if you are trying to get your ankles locked in securely, you don't have to bend all the way down towards your ankles. it's right here and so it's really nice and comfortable and solid. you hear it kind of click and lock in. so it's good that you know it's in there. it doesn't have to be super tight where you're not getting circulation to the area, but you want it to be comfortable, but firm in there. so that's really nice. again the handles here are nice because when you're going into the inversion, if you want that little bit of extra stretch you can do that as well, but you usually have your hands up above you and i'll show you that. the the the backrest part is it's firm, but it's nice because it gives you that nice stretch. i've got my little head pillow there, this makes it a little bit more squishy for comfort there, and then there's also for advanced users some pieces um that you can use in the back rest there as well that i'll show you in a second. so i'm going to go into the inversion. and just kind of show you. you really want to go kind of slow. you don't want to just zoom back. and basically you're just going to lie back and you're going to use your arms to help you go. so i'm going to i'm going to kind of show you and then i'll talk about it. so you can see once i'm back here i'm already getting a little bit of a stretch. but as i move my arms you can see that it moves a little bit so you want to be comfortable. some people like to give that all the way stretch going back. for me after a little bit, sometimes with my tight shoulders i can feel it some, so i might just rest it on the headrest back here. but i'm still getting that nice traction. i'm on the green i'm just at about 20 degrees. again i would start off with this and really go for a couple weeks before you go any further. make sure that your body's comfortable ,but make sure it's nice and elongated. make sure that you know you're going slow so your body gets used to it. now after your one to two minutes when you when you come back up, um they do recommend that you just kind of come a little bit past neutral just to get your body used to coming back up. so you can see as i start to bring my hands up, i'll just come up a little bit. and so not zooming back up really quickly, but then you can go. if your arms aren't getting you to come up, you can also bend your knees a little bit and that will help pull you down. so like i mentioned earlier for advanced users they do have some extra accessories. this is a lumbar bridge to give you a little bit of extension into your back when you're doing it. and you can put it in there and then there's also acupressure nodes. and they have different heights so it goes you know shorter medium and longer just to give you some of those acupressure points while you're doing the traction. but again these are for a little more advanced users, so you might not want to start off with these and then you can look more on their website how to use them. so if you're interested in purchasing this or any other teeter products, make sure and click on the link up there. and remember be safe, have fun, and i hope you feel better soon.