I've been dealing with low back pain for a year now and a friend told me I could benefit from doing "core" exercises, what does that mean and will it help with my back pain?

The "core" has become a popular term that refers to the muscles that both stabilizes and provides movement for the spine and the pelvis. These muscles make up the muscular support for the front, back, top, bottom and sides of our trunk.

"Core" exercises are specific exercises designed to strengthen these muscles. These exercises can include bridges, planks, dead bugs, swimmers, crunches, and functional based movements and can include equipment such as phyioballs, therabands, or medicine balls. The caution with starting the "core" exercises while experiencing back pain is that many of these exercises may exacerbate symptoms significantly without a gradual and graded introduction to them. It can also be extremely challenging to target the appropriate weak muscles thereby further perpetuating muscle imbalances or dysfunctional movement patterns.

A look at the current research on the topic of "core" strengthening applied to chronic non-specific low back pain is showing that the exercise program needs to specifically target a noted deficit related to the cause of the low back pain to be effective. That means that for the exercises to be beneficial for you they must be directed at a specific cause of your symptoms (poor strength, muscle imbalance, instability, etc).

A visit to your Physical Therapist can determine the deficits related to your back pain, decide on the appropriateness of a "core" strengthening program, and implement a plan for a graded introduction of exercises; whether it is "core" strengthening, stretches, posture re-education, motor control, or another program entirely.

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