A Cryin' Shame

The more things change the more they stay the same.

In 1986, MedX Corporation introduced a Lumbar Extension machine that was up for a Nobel Prize in medicine. Fourteen years of research and development, 3,000 prototypes, $88 million invested and extensive research that proved beyond a doubt the effectiveness, cost efficiency and reliability of the machine should have assured its place in the field of exercise and medicine. A decade of research conducted at the University of Florida concluded that the MedX device was the ONLY meaningful way to access the muscles that extend the spine from a strength perspective. Add to that - eighty percent of chronic low-back patients responded to the machine by having a reduction in pain perception after a 12-week protocol; 30-33% became pain free.

The machine should have been a hit, but was rejected by the medical community. According to Dr. Michael Fulton, an orthopod who worked with MedX inventor Arthur Jones, the device threatened them (doctors). . . would have put many out of business. Sad, but true.

Since then, MedX Corporation has introduced a gym version of the same, a machine you can use without help, giving more people access to an effective treatment for chronic back pain. Almost as restrictive, equally effective, fairly expensive. The result? Much the same. Few gyms have it. They won't spend the money for something better. "We have a back machine already." Yeah, you sure do. Good luck.

So, the same thing has happened. The MedX device has been perceived as just another machine, in an era when machines are out. It has resulted in the following scenarios:

1. A friend from Florida to whom I introduced the MedX Lumbar Extension machine, tried to locate one near his home. He had to travel 45 minutes to the nearest place. When he arrived, no one knew anything about the machine that sat in the corner covered in a mantle of dust. The instructor didn't know anything about it, so my friend proceeded to use it alone. He still makes that lonely 45-minute voyage once a week or two to a dusty corner of a gym that knows nothing about what it has. At least it has it.

2. A therapist was hired to head the rehab center where I once worked. The PhD was a self-described "hands on" therapist, didn't use machines. One of his first questions was, "How much can we get for the pair?" (Lumbar and Cervical extension machines valued originally at $120,000). I went to show him how to use the machines; ended up trying to convince him that they had exercise value. Luckily, several patients were addicted to the results they had received. He was forced to use them. I hope it's still the case.

3. There's a MedX Lumbar machine where I work in North Carolina - a private country club. Our director remains unconvinced of its usefullness despite my efforts. So, she's initiating a "Healthy Spine" program which amounts to a thrice-a-week exposure to an hour of core training. Twelve hours a month. I have used the MedX machine for 21 years - 90 seconds a month, two back operations, pain-free for 21 years. A lot of people could save a lot of time - 11 hours, 58 1/2 minutes per month - with better results, if they'd listen or read . . . or something.

As Arthur would say, "It's a cryin' shame."

Back Extension Dynamics

There is a common fear among medical doctors and physical therapists of allowing low-back patients to move to a position of complete extension. The fear is based on the premise that extension (a position that extends beyond the normal standing position of a patient - lordosis) diminishes the already narrow and potentially dangerous spaces available to the lumbar discs.

In lordosis, most people demonstrate less disc space between vertebrae in the rear section of the spine than the front. Movement toward flexion (performing a stomach crunch, curl or pelvic tilt) creates more equitable spacing - front and back. That is, the space in the front and rear of the spine between vertebrae evens out, a plus for a struggling disc. Doctors and therapists, therefore, freely recommend flexion exercise as a first choice. Many of the same, however, are skeptical of movement in the direction of extension, despite the fact that such movement has proven as effective in resolving low-back problems. The reason, once again, lies in the belief that disc space, poor in lordosis, must be worse in extension. Not so.

When the vertebrae of the lumbar spine are in a position of lordosis (normal standing) and/or flexion (bent forward), the rotation point between any single vertebra and its neighbor (above or below) lies between the vertebral walls. This means that one vertebra balances on the other like a teeter-totter, with muscles (as weak as they generally are) holding things in place. When vertebrae move from lordosis to extension, the dynamics change. At some point, the facets of neighboring vertebrae (structural protrusions on the rear sides) contact one another, changing the rotation point between them. The vertebrae suddenly rotate from an axis beyond the rear of their walls. The greater the extension, the greater the space between vertebrae, both in the front and rear of the spine. Dynamic X-rays clearly show that the greatest space in the rear of the lumbar vertebrae occurs in maximum extension.

It led the man who discovered the phenomenon, Arthur Jones to comment, "Doctors have been looking at dynamic X-rays and MRI pictures of the lumbar spine for 50 years, and no one noticed." Jones then took it a step beyond. The grade-four dropout developed a precise method of measuring the space dynamics during movement to concrete his conjecture.

The knee-jerk response of the medical community upon hearing the news was denial, followed by cries that "not all disc problems should be exposed to extension - the majority respond to flexion, the safe alternative." And while it is true that not all patients can tolerate movement toward extension, approximately 80% can and respond with a reduction in pain perception, a fact established through extensive research on the safest, most valid and effective extension exercise - the MedX Lumbar Extension machine. Approximately 33% of chronic low-back patients became pain free after a simple 12-week protocol.

From a mechanical perspective, extension movements reduce the danger of further pinching a disc. Of that, there can be NO discussion.