Healthy hip and knee joints are so important in ideal body movement.
So much of our day to day activities rely on movement of our hips and knees: General walking, going up the stairs, nearly all sports as well as small tasks like getting dressed, bending down, and the sitting to standing motion.
Good spinal motion and neurology is vital to providing function to the muscles surrounding these joints as well as the structure of our pelvis supporting these joints.
The Chiropractic Angle
The pelvis is huge in enabling good hip and knee function.
We see in our office rotation through the sacrum and sacroiliac joints.
Think how this can change hip and knee function.
If we have rotation in the sacrum, it can change the height of the hip joints making one higher than the other.
This will put different forces on the hips, musculature, ligaments and other soft tissue structures which will have ongoing effects.
The flow-on of this directly impacts the knees as well.
This may be noticed in having a singular clicky knee, more tightness in just one side or further down the leg seeing rotation or asymmetrical movement in our walk.
Muscular Activation
Good muscular activation is so important for our hips and knees.
The best part of this is working on specific muscles benefits all the low back, hips and knees at the same time.
Muscles to work on:
- Gluteus Maximus: the biggest muscle – your butt muscle. Known to benefit the lower back, hips and knees. Pilates style movements like bridges are fantastic at isolating this muscle.
- Glute Medius/Minimus: The side glute muscle. It is vital for hip function and plays more of a stabilising role of the knee for agility activities.
- VMO: The Vastus Medialis Oblique is specific to patella tracking for ideal knee function. Our lateral quads can overpower the medial quads and specific exercises here are very powerful at proper tracking of our knee movement.
Longevity of movement
Mobility and longevity are strongly linked. These preventative strengthening exercises are huge for keeping people moving well from a young age right through into older age.
One of the most important movements anyone can continue to do with age is going from sitting to standing. It is key for independence, so maximising these now is vital.
All of these muscles are also vital in preventing or recovering from hip and knee replacements, so I always tell my patients that doing these exercises will give us 3 outcomes.
- Not needing a replacement
- Delaying the replacement
- Recovering easier and faster because these muscles are firing as they should
If you would like some more information about your posture, the spine and nervous system and how it relates to your health, please call our clinic on (02) 6257 9400 or check out the other articles on our Facebook page or go to our website: www.spinecentre.com.au