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This article is a transcribed edited summary of a video Bob and Brad recorded in March of 2024. For the original video go to https://youtu.be/FhQ4dBx2zN0
Brad: All right this is a very important video about chest pain. I personally have been to the emergency room three separate times because I had chest pain. Now I'm going to tell you and Mike, are going to explain how I got chest pain and more importantly, how I got rid of it.
Mike: Now, chest pain can obviously be from the heart, which can be a fatal situation. So it is important to go to your doctor and get a proper diagnosis.
Brad: Right, now, once you are certain and a doctor has ruled out that your heart is not the problem, then you can come into this video and we're gonna show you the details and how you can fix it without a big effort. Now, I found out on my third visit that the ER doctor said, "Don't worry, there's at least a 50/50 chance "that it's not your heart." And he said, that's from his experience. And I've looked into it and typically that's what you'll find. Oftentimes it's not the heart, and a good relief.
Mike: Now there are three common causes of chest pain you can experience, not heart related, and that is GERD, or also known as heartburn for some people, it is also a musculoskeletal issue, or it can be caused by anxiety of sorts.
Brad: Right, now, doctors are good at helping you with anxiety or with GERD, in other words, the heartburn with medications. But musculoskeletal, which was what I was diagnosed with, they really didn't have an answer. And I thought, well, I'm a physical therapist. This should be right up my alley. And I did not have an answer myself. So after doing some research on the internet, we found a physical therapist actually from New Zealand, who actually had the same problem, severe chest pain, really interfering with his life. And it was not from his heart, it was musculoskeletal. And he actually found the cause and more importantly, how to fix it.
Mike: So we actually interviewed Steve August in the past to talk about this issue very much in-depth and what tools you can use to help fix it.
Brad: That's right. So I'm going to give you the long story short on what causes musculoskeletal pain in your chest right here. Now, when I have it on the right side, it's where the ribs connect to my sternum. That's why we have Sam here. How you doing, big guy? Alright, so here is the source of my pain. It's where the ribs connect and they're actually cartilage. And it's cartilage where it connects to the sternum, and there has to be movement there.
Brad: Okay? Not too much. And what actually happens, where the pain comes from is from back here where the ribs connect to the vertebra. Okay? We get a closeup here, Mike is pointing to where the joint is, where the rib connects to the vertebra.
Brad: Now when you breathe, the ribs expand and they go down. So there has to be motion and that motion needs to come from that joint. Look at this, so when you breathe in, it goes up and when you breathe out, it goes down.
Brad: This motion becomes locked up. What happens is the motion has to come from somewhere so you can breathe and it actually comes from the front. There's some arthritis in this area. When you get that moving, it causes pain and you have pain and it's very tender. Now there's a nice way to help determine if you know you don't have heart pain. In my case, what I do is I start to palpate or push in and see if I can find a sore spot. Now, I've had three or four doctors actually do this to me and they would push around and they really, you know, good doctors, but they weren't real good with assessing this particular diagnosis. I found if I would work in there, there'd be a point about the size of a dime and it would be really tender. If I push on it, that would be the hot spot. And that spot would take the pain and would radiate out. Very clear it's not from the heart, it's from that point. So we need to break this up to take the stress off the front where the rib connects to the sternum and relax it and the pain goes away. It's worked out quite well. Let's show you how it works.
Mike: So the condition Brad is talking about is called costochondritis. And in order to treat it, you'll need one of two things. Either a softball, if you have one available, and if that happens to work well, you can get a Backpod, which is created to treat this issue.
Brad: Right, so Steve August actually got very involved in creating this specifically for this problem. But the good thing about it is there are other conditions you can treat with it too, SI joint, back pain, hip. So it's not just for costochondritis, but this is what I use. I've been using it for years with great success. Now let's show you how to use it. Now the treatment is actually done lying on the floor on your back, I'm going to show you on Mike, the locations along the rib cage in the back where you actually put the pressure. So if you're using the ball or the Backpod, we're going to start out with Mike on the right side. That's where my pain is so I work the right side, but I also work the left side for maintenance because I want to make sure it's clear throughout. So we'll start out lower. We've got the shoulder blade here where the ball is. We're going to go just below that just to the right of the spine. You do not go on the spine, it's that muscle between the spine and the scapula or the shoulder blade. I'll work it here. Then I'll go up and I'll go up and I actually go four locations and I do the same thing, starting low, two, three, four, on the other side as well.
Brad: It takes me about two minutes and I'm done. So let's go down to the floor and get the details. Now, if you're using a tennis or a softball, you could try a baseball. Softball is probably better, it's a little bigger. This can be fairly aggressive. So I'm going to show you with the Backpod, but if you have the ball, it's the same thing. You just replace the Backpod with the ball. Now the first time you do it, I would take a towel, fold it up so there's four to six layers, whatever it takes because it's going to be a little uncomfortable on your back, more than likely, unless you're used to something like this, which most people aren't. The towel on there gives you a little comfort. And now I'm going to go down on the left of the spine, just below the shoulder blade. There we go again, I do it on both sides, although the right side is my involved side and you're going to lean back into it. And then you can work forward and backward. And we're mobilizing that joint where the rib connects to the vertebra.
Brad: Now what Steve likes to do, he says, emphasize it with taking your arm and going up over the top of your head. You can do both arms at the same time. It's a little more aggressive. To start out with, you may just want to do one arm, extend and arch and go back and do that a few times.
Brad: And after I did this for a couple of weeks, I started to actually go back and forth and it helps mobilize that joint and it actually does some good myofascial stretch. I don't know if that does anything for the costochondritis, but it sure feels good on my back.
Brad: So after you do that in all the locations and you're done now, you'll get used to it after a while you can take the towel, set it off to the side, and you'll feel the difference. And this is where it really gets into those joints and helps mobilize it and break that arthritic joint up, get it moving. And again, reach overhead and back. And what I typically do, like I mentioned with Mike, is I'll finish with one after a few repetitions and I'm going to slide down about two inches, get the ribs upwards or towards the neck, and do this. I typically go with one arm, you can go with both. Sometimes I'll really get aggressive and you know, I did not like this at first and actually now I look forward to doing it because it just makes everything feels good. I know Bob has done it. It's great for your posture as well.
Brad: I'm going up to my third area. Now, I do go all the way up to my upper trap. Doesn't have anything to do with my costochondritis, but boy does it feel good. And get those muscles relaxed, help the posture and I'll work back and forth.
Brad: And that really does a nice job and that area. And then I'll do that on both sides. This is that simple. You need to do it daily. And if you got that costochondritis pain, you should feel relief easily within one to two weeks. So boy, it is a real nasty experience when you have that chest pain and you're wondering, is this a heart attack or is this costochondritis? Get rid of it, use the Backpod, and then you don't have to think about it. That's been my experience and I wish you good luck with it. Mike, do you have anything to say?
Mike: If you would like to learn more information about costochondritis, you could check out the interview Bob did with Steve a while ago titled, "Costochondritis? Self-Treatment Advice: Worldwide Expert Steve August."
Brad: That's right. I highly recommend watching that whole interview. Steve is just a wonderful man and he's very sincere about what he does. He actually gives these in services to physicians to educate them. He's way out there in regards of the physical therapy world with this topic.
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