Importance of posture analysis

1. Importance of Postural
Analysis in Physiotherapy
By
P. Senthil, MPT, CPS, (PhD),
Professor,
Mohamad Sathak A J College of Physiotherapy,
Chennai.

2. Does Posture Correction Matter?
• How much?
• Why?
• How do we change it?

3. What is Posture?
Posture is not a position, but a dynamic pattern of
reflexes, habits, and adaptive responses to anything
that resists you being more or less upright and
functional, such as:
• Gravity, of course!
• Awkward working conditions, which may be
unavoidable.
• Abnormal anatomy.
• Athletic challenges.

4. • If you start to tip over, or lose the stability you
need for a task, postural reflexes kick in and
engage muscles to pull you into a more or less
upright and/or functional position again.
• The biological systems and tricks that keep us
upright are neat — and surprisingly poorly
understood.

5. • Posture is also more than the sum of those parts, more
than “just” a collection of righting and stabilizing reflexes —
it is the way we live, the shape of our flexible “container,”
the physical manifestation of our comfort zone.
• We habitually hold ourselves and move in ways that serve
social and emotional needs, or avoid clashing with them:
posture can be submissive or dominant, happy or sad,
brave or fearful, apathetic or uptight.
• The challenges and rewards of trying to change posture are
not just musculoskeletal, and it can be a personally
profound process. Patterns and behaviours that lead to
trouble are usually strong.

6. Posture is the embodiment of
our comfort zone.
At worst, it can be like
a Cage.

7. What is “Poor Posture”?
• More precisely stated now: Poor Posture is an
unnecessary and problematic pattern of physical
responses to Postural challenges.
• Sitting for hours with your knees tucked sharply
under your chair is a classic example, and it’s a
real hazard to kneecaps— avoidable and
entirely caused by a lack of awareness of how
knees work.

8. • What about Postural laziness? That’s what
most people picture when they think of poor
posture.
• The avoidance of Postural challenges leads
over time to Poor Postural fitness.
• If you avoid postural challenges enough,
eventually you’ll have trouble coping with
them when you have to … and so we’re back
to the first definition (POOR POSTURE).

9. Factors leading to Poor Posture:
• Genetics & Hereditary
• Current/past injuries
• Job – Related
• Aging process
• Stature – height
• Psychological aspect – emotional-confidence, joy,
depression, fear, mood.
• Anatomy of women
• Pregnancy
• Culture
• Fatigue posture

10. Poor Posture Related Injuries
• Ligaments can permanently stretch
• Cartilages can be damaged due to abnormal friction
• Disc injuries
• Neurological problems like headaches, numbness,
tingling
• Arthritic changes in weight-bearing joints
• Decreased ROM, Strength, and Joint dysfunction.
• Continuous and long-term pain
• Work-related musculoskeletal disorders
• Cumulative Trauma cycle

11. The Evolution of Posture:

12. Why Implement A Posture Assessment
Program?
• Critical to assesses body alignment and design
exercise prescription.
• Improve Our Professional skill level.
• Re-evaluation and measure outcome of
patient.
• Visual feedback mechanism to Patients.
• For Research proposal and Documentation.
• Referral source will be increased.

13. Does Posture matter?

14. Does Posture matter?
POOR
POSTURAL
FITNESS

15. How to Assess Posture?
• Visual Observation method.
• Goniometric method.
• Plumb line method.
• Photographic and Digitization method.
• Radiographic method.
• Photogrammetric method.
• Posture Grid charts.
• Posture analysis software.
• 2D & 3D Video-Motion analysis.

19. Can you Change posture?
• Much of what we perceive as “Poor Posture”
is the result of biological adaption over
decades and is unlikely to change without a
truly heroic effort — and perhaps not even
then.
• In principle, humans can adapt to almost
anything — in fact, it’s the law.
• However, the same principle dictates that
change is slow and difficult.

20. Address Major systemic barriers to
success

21. CONCLUSION:
• Posture is almost certainly associated with
some pain problems.
• Much of so-called “Poor Posture” is actually
just postural strain and bad ergonomics.
• Poor Posture are probably the result of long-
term biological adaptation that is either
extremely difficult or impossible to change.
• Posture can affect mood, emotion and
probably pain sensitivity.

22. • EARLIER EVALUATION AND CORRECTION OF
POSTURAL ADAPTATION HELPS TO MAINTAIN
POSTURAL FITNESS AND PHYSICAL
CAPABILITY OF INDIVIDUALS.

23. Thank you