Is the pain in your back causing you a lack of sleep at night? How about that knee, hip, or shoulder pain throughout the day? Is limited flexibility causing inability to perform certain exercises and movements? Well, the good news is that a posture assessment can highlight imbalances in your body and discover solutions for problem areas.
What is a posture assessment?
A posture assessment
– Looks at alignment of ankles, knees, hips, pelvis, ribcage, scapula, shoulders and head. Basically, the entire body alignment is checked and recorded.
– From the posture assessment, shortened/tight muscles and lengthened/overstretched muscles are discovered.
– The imbalances and discoveries can be addressed through exercises to assist in strengthening lengthened muscles and stretching shortened muscles.
– Your body begins to feel better, become more balanced, and risk of injuries is reduced. Your stability, coordination, strength, and flexibility tend to improve, depending on the exercises assigned.
– With each posture assessment, different exercises will be emphasized. This may change regularly depending on occupation and activity levels.
What is a fitness assessment?
– A fitness assessment does what the name implies. It assesses your fitness levels. It can do this by looking at your posture, flexibility, strength, cardiovascular level, and more.
– There are many different types of fitness assessments. However, regardless of the type of assessment, specific exercises for your body should become part of your routine.
Remember that personal trainers and health professionals can assist with issues, but do see a physiotherapist or doctor if problems are bigger and/or persist. Personal trainers and doctors or physiotherapists can then work alongside each other.
A good fitness assessment and posture assessment will provide information on what exercises are particularly helpful for your general health and fitness. These results can be very interesting for you, or they can be just for your fitness professional. That way, you know you’re doing exercises that are best for your body. Try getting a fitness/posture assessment and see how your exercise routine can be taken to the next level.
Photo credit: Photo by David Paterson at www.davidpaterson.photoreflect.com
Great information. Thanks for your post. As a physiotherapist working in Toronto, I often find that injuries develop due to poor alignment and postures. If you are injury free, it is great to get your posture assessed so that you can work on exercises that are most pertinent to your body type. This will surely help you prevent injuries down the line. Also, these types of assessments will make you more aware of your body and help you learn how to position yourself more optimally at work, at the gym or in life.