Background: My mom is 62 years old, 4’9" 100 lbs. She has S-shaped scoliosis and severe pain in her lower back and right side, just above her hip. She does not exercise, and she has osteoporosis. She doesn’t take any medication (and she doesn’t like to, in general).
What happened: Four weeks ago, she fell which resulted in a compression fracture at the T5 level. After the fall, she started having pain in her rib cage (more on the right side than the left), and increasing pain on the right side of her lower back.
Currently she’s doing physical therapy with exercise bands at home. Band rows, “anti-rotation punch”, “abdominal bracing”, etc. from the HEP2Go program. No injections or procedures were recommended. The pain has been bad after the fall, especially on her right side.
Questions:
- Do you recommend that she wears a brace to stabilize the fracture and prevent the scoliosis from worsening?
- In general, what can be done to prevent the worsening of her scoliosis?
- What could be done to reduce the pain? My assumption is that it’s a result of the fall and fracture, although the doctor said it isn’t.
- Are there any exercises you recommend that would be safe for her, given her scoliosis and osteoporosis? I taught her to deadlift a year ago but she stopped after a few weeks because it was causing her pain (maybe a result of my bad coaching).
We are happy to do a video consultation as well if this requires a more detailed discussion. Thanks for your help.