Introduction to Inversion Benefits
Try hanging upside down for just a few moments and you'll understand why millions of people around the world use this ancient therapy to relieve back pain, reduce stress and improve their quality of life, just some of the top inversion benefits.
Today's methods are more accessible and luckily more comfortable. Set the Teeter Hang Ups® to your desired angle of inversion, rotate on our precision balance system, which allows you total control of the speed and rotation with simple weight displacement of your arms. Then relax. In just a few minutes, the body decompresses naturally using your body weight and gravity, so soft tissue in the joints can hydrate and decompress. Progressive decompression allows each joint to be decompressed by the same weight that compresses it while upright. This "perfect" stretch helps naturally relieve back pain keeping the weight-bearing joints healthy and allows the weight-bearing skeleton to align which results in better balance, posture, and symmetry.
In addition to the rehabilitative benefits, many doctors, physical therapists and sports trainers recognize inversion benefits as an effective way to prevent compression fatigue joint injuries. In fact, even the U.S. Army Physical Fitness School intends to include inversion into their worldwide physical training doctrine. Whatever your reason for inverting, Teeter Hang Ups® inversion equipment provides a secure and easy way to improve your health and quality of life.
The industry leader since 1981, Teeter Hang Ups® has focused solely on producing the best value inversion equipment with time-proven design features that ensure dependability and user security. When you want a natural, in-home solution for a healthier back, try inversion – if you value quality, look to Teeter Hang Ups. The only brand certifiedto UL 60601-1 Medical Grade Standards and supported by an independent engineer evaluation to have the highest factor of safety and ease of assembly.
Back Pain
Re-hydrate discs | Reduce Nerve Pressure | Realign Your Spine | Relax Tense Muscles
Rehydrate Discs
Damaged discs can take a long time to repair since they don't have a direct blood supply. Inverted decompression takes pressure off the discs, allowing them to widen and hydrate with nutrients that help expedite repair. The added cushion helps increase shock absorption and flexibility.
Reduce Nerve Pressure
Inverting on a Teeter has been clinically proven to increase intervertebral separation[1], helping to open up the passageway for nerve roots and alleviating pain caused by pinched nerves[2]. Those who experience sciatic pain can gain inversion benefits. Less pressure means less pain.
Photography
Inverting to as little as 25° for a few minutes can help relax muscles and speed lymph flow. A study conducted by phisiotherapist, LG Nosse found that EMG activity (an indicator of muscle tension) declined over 35% within ten seconds of inverting.[4]
Realign
The back is supported by hundreds of ligaments and muscles that stabilize the spine but also hold it in compression. When the back moves out of alignment from bad posture, too much sitting, or rotational activities, this support structure holds the body in misalignment. Even while lying down, your spine maintains 25% of standing pressure, especially in your lumbar. In order to decompress, the spine needs a traction force of at least 60% of your body weight, roughly equivalent to inverting at an angle of 60° on a Teeter[3]. This type of progressive decompression naturally re-aligns the weight-bearing skeleton, promoting good posture.
Helps to Relieve Stress and Fatigue
Inversion can lower your heart rate through rhythmic rocking on the table | Reduces muscle tension by lowering EMG activity (an indicator of muscle tension) | Provides an upside-down full-body stretch
Full Body Stretch
Inversion therapy offers an enhanced version of a full body stretch, which is rejuvenating and can also help to reduce muscle tension and overall soreness. The Nose study found that EMG activity declined over 35% within ten seconds of inverting, which suggests that inversion can help to relieve tension and pain in your muscles that are caused by stress.[5]
Reverse Gravity
For centuries, yoga practitioners have recognized the concept of turning the body upside down to find relaxation. The head stand position is a form of "postural exchange" (reversing the direction of gravity). While a headstand may not top everyone's list of favorite activities, inversion can provide all the benefits with minimal practice or effort.
Relaxation
Inversion therapy is an extension of the way a body naturally relaxes. With an inversion table, you have the ability to rock slowly up and down. This has been shown to decrease heart rate [6] and can induce a state of relaxation, much as one might rock a baby back and forth to sooth him.
*This is only a tool to help inform you about the benefits of inversion therapy, and should not be considered as medical advice. Always consult your doctor before trying inversion or beginning any type of new exercise regimen.
Helps Improve Circulation and Accelerates the Cleansing of Blood and Lymph Fluids
Helps circulation by aiding your heart in moving blood from the lower limbs | Can help relieve varicose veins | Helps move lactic acid out of limbs | Assists in lymphatic drainage
Ease Circulation
The cardiovascular system is your body's transportation system, carrying food and oxygen to your body's cells. Oxygen-rich blood from the lungs travels out through the arteries and waste-filled blood comes back through the veins to be cleansed and recharged with oxygen. Inversion allows your body to work with gravity to ease the circulation process by placing your lower limbs “above” your heart and thus improving your circulation. Some suggest that the improvements inversion has on your circulatory system can temporarily help decrease the appearance of varicose veins. When inverting, you are helping your heart to clear the blood from your feet, legs, and lower body. [7]
Relaxation
In her book Beyond Cellulite[9], Nicole Ronsard discusses the role of the lymph system in creating cellulite, and ways in which people can help stimulate lymph flow to reduce cellulite. She explains that when the flow of lymph is slowed down, a stagnation of fluid occurs in the tissues. In areas where circulation tends to be poor and relies almost entirely on gravity to move it back up, as in the hip and thigh area, this stagnation encourages the formation of cellulite. By "reversing" the flow of blood and lymph fluids in the body, you can increase the nourishment of cells and accelerate the removal of wastes. She recommends inversion: “The slantboard is particularly effective because it's easy to use, and it allows for long, sustained periods of reversal.”
Cleanse & Flush
Unlike the cardiovascular system, the lymphatic system has no pump. Only the alternate contraction and relaxation of muscles moves lymphatic fluid upward through capillaries and one-way valves to the upper chest for cleansing and flushing. Inverting the body so that gravity works with these one-way valves helps to push the lactic fluid up to the chest.[8]
*This is only a tool to help inform you about the benefits of inversion therapy, and should not be considered as medical advice. Always consult your doctor before trying inversion or beginning any type of new exercise regimen.
Helps Increase Oxygen Flow to the Brain
Provides oxygen to brain cells, helping them to develop and thrive | Aspects of senility are caused by lack of oxygen to the brain, inversion increases oxygen supply | Oxygen to the head could also help improve skin tone, stimulate hair growth and help with mental acuity
Brain Needs Oxygen
Your heart must work against gravity to pump blood up to your brain, which is the body's largest consumer of oxygen. Although it is only three percent of the body's total weight, the brain consumes 25 percent of the body's oxygen intake.
Develop Cells
Win Wenger, in How to Increase Your Intelligence, noted that "only those brain cells which are close to an ample capillary blood supply are thoroughly developed. Away from such source of supply, brain cells remain undeveloped and useless." Wenger describes "upside down activities" to increase oxygen supply to the brain. He states, "In short, you can improve the physical state of your entire brain."
Reduce Deterioration
Peter Russell notes in The Brain Book that the deterioration of the brain is not directly linked to age alone. Rather, this deterioration is caused by hardening arteries and high blood pressure, both of which decrease the supply of oxygen to the brain. Thus a major step in reducing mental deterioration (or senility) over time may simply be increasing the oxygen supply to the brain. Keeping the brain active and well-supplied with oxygen may help maintain your brain function and mental acuity throughout your entire life.[10]
Overall Health
Some people claim that increasing the circulation of blood to the head through inversion may also improve the color and tone of your skin, stimulate mental alertness, and improve hearing and vision. In addition, some claim that hair will be healthier, and may even grow again if the scalp is well supplied with blood.
*This is only a tool to help inform you about the benefits of inversion therapy, and should not be considered as medical advice. Always consult your doctor before trying inversion or beginning any type of new exercise regimen.
Helps Reduce the Effects of Aging Caused by the Force of Gravity
Can help recover lost height due to thinning discs in the spine | Can help organs that have settled in the midsection return to their normal place – and reduce inches from your midsection
Maintain Height
Most people will lose from 1/2" - 2" (1-5 cm) in height during their lifetime due to thinning discs. As a baby, your discs are 90% water. However, the water content in the discs decreases to 70% by age 70. An active inversion program can help maintain more of your original height.
Lose Inches
As the body ages, internal organs (kidneys, stomach, intestines) begin to prolapse as a result of the constant downward force of gravity. "Middle-age spread" (that spare-tire around the waste), apart from weight gain, is due to the relocation of internal organs. Digestion and waste elimination problems are also common symptoms of organs going south. A regular program of inversion may help ease the strain on prolapsed organs or even help them resume their normal shape and place in the body.
*This is only a tool to help inform you about the benefits of inversion therapy, and should not be considered as medical advice. Always consult your doctor before trying inversion or beginning any type of new exercise regimen.
Improve Functional Fitness
Helps maintain flexibility | Helps correct misalignments | Strengthens ligaments to prevent injury | Provides balance and orientation training for athletes
Maintain Flexibility
Nearly every physical activity involves compression of the spine. The compressive effect of gravity is compounded by activities such as walking, running, weightlifting, gardening, skiing, biking, and golf; all of which can exact an incredible toll on the spine, discs, and back muscles.
Skeletal misalignments can occur at even the slightest provocation. Most often these misalignments are nominal and will readily correct themselves given the opportunity. Inversion with movement (such as side-to-side bends, back arches, and a partial sit-up or two) provides that opportunity.
One-sided activities can be particularly troublesome for two reasons: The body will tend to over compensate for the strong-side muscle groups, pulling the spine out of alignment, and one-sided activities usually involve rotation of the spine, often under incredible loads. Examples of these activities are golf, water skiing, tennis, bowling, racquetball, and baseball. Inversion after physical activity may help to realign the spine and keep athletes performing at higher levels for longer periods of time.
Still other physical activities tend to create tension in the muscles due to a contraction of the major muscle groups for long periods of time. Housework, gardening, bicycling, and rollerblading are examples of activities which tend to create a great deal of lower back strain. Anyone who is faced with weekend chores, or enjoys an occasion bike ride can receive a tremendous boost from daily inversion therapy.
Strengthen Ligaments
Ligaments are the fibrous strips that hold your bones together. Ligaments are flexible but not very elastic, and can tear when they are stretched too much. Ligaments that are not moved regularly in the right way become stiff, inelastic and more easily torn, inversion can help strengthen your ligaments and may help prevent injury. The gentle reverse loading and movement that occurs while you invert strengthens ligaments and connective tissue, and helps to protect the athlete from serious injury.
Balance and Orientation Training
Inversion helps to develop balance awareness, which occurs when the upper regions of the inner ear are stimulated. Skydivers, gymnasts, springboard divers, and scuba divers find that inversion therapy fine-tunes the body and inner ear to the inverted world. Inversion therapy has also been used to normalize the ear canal as a treatment for motion sickness.
*This is only a tool to help inform you about the benefits of inversion therapy, and should not be considered as medical advice. Always consult your doctor before trying inversion or beginning any type of new exercise regimen.
A Final Thought on Inversion Benefits
Inversion helps you escape the constant force of gravity to slow or reverse its harmful effects. Used sensibly, there are inversion benefits and no more dangerous than other fitness activities.
The Power of Gravity
The constant pull of gravity is the most powerful force your body will see during your lifetime. Inversion offers a system of stretching and light exercise that helps to slow or reverse the harmful compression of the body by gravity. Used sensibly, there are benefits of inversion, and no more dangerous than many other popular and widely practiced fitness activities.
Beyond Back Pain
The experience of thousands of people who invert regularly is that it gives them the relief from back pain they've been looking for. Just as important, they gain the rejuvenating inversion benefits on the entire body, providing health benefits far beyond the relief of back pain.
[2] Kane, M, et al: Effects of Gravity-facilitated Traction on Intervertebral Dimensions of the Lumbar, Spine. Journal of Orthopedic and Sports Phys Ther. 281-288, Mar 85
[3] Nachemson, A, et al: Intravital Dynamic Pressure Measurements in Lumbar Discs. Scandinavian Journal of Rehab Medicine, supplement, 1970.
[4] Nosse, L.: Inverted Spinal Traction. Arch Phys Med Rehabilitation 59: 367-370, Aug 78.
[5] Nosse, L.: Inverted Spinal Traction. Arch Phys Med Rehabilitation 59: 367-370, Aug 78.
[6] Wilkins, R et al: Circulatory effects of the head-down position (negative g) in normal man, with a note on some measures designed to relieve cranial congestion in this position. Journal Clin. Invest. 29: 940-949, 1950.
[7] Wilkins, R et al: Circulatory effects of the head-down position (negative g) in normal man, with a note on some measures designed to relieve cranial congestion in this position. Journal Clin. Invest. 29: 940-949, 1950.
[8] Jahnke, Roger. O.M.D., The Lymph. June 19, 2000. http://www.healthy.net/scr/Article.asp?Id=993.
[9] Ronsard, N. Beyond Cellulite. p 12, 146. New York: Villard Books, 1992.
[10] You should talk to your doctor about inverting if you have uncontrolled high blood pressure. Consult the contraindications page for more information and other contraindications.