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Articles below are written by Emily c Harrison

 

 http://www.danceinforma.com/USA_magazine/2013/12/03/injury-prevention-101-stress-fractures-and-spondylolysis/

Zouk and Bone

-Injury prevention and understanding body

Nutrition recommendations for preventing and recovering from bone breaks, stress reactions, or stress fractures.By Emily C. Harrison MS, RD, LDWith our highly active and high impact lifestyles, dancers can be prone to bone stress.

 

What can you do ensure your bones are ready for the demands of dance?Bone is living tissue, and good bone health requires good nutrition. One way to avoid stress fractures/ reactions is to get adequate calories from protein, carbs, and fat. Calorie needs for dancers can vary depending on your size, age, gender, and activity level. (See Dancernutrition.com for information on estimating calorie needs). Going for long periods of time without eating or extreme dieting will compromise bone mineral density and jeopardize your bone strength. Cutting your calories too heavily will not help you become a stronger dancer.Hormones also play a big role in bone health. Decreased or absent menstruation in females is a warning sign. Please see a health care professional if dietary intake or menstruation is a problem.

 

Vitamins and Minerals for bone health, ages 13 and up Calcium: 1300-1500 mgVitamin D: 10-15 micrograms (600-800 IU) avoid large doses and get 15 min of sun/dayVitamin C: 100 mg (avoid large doses)Vitamin K: 75-90 microgramsPhosphorus: 1250 mg/day

 

Did you know that you can get all these from food sources?Protein: Did you know that too much can actually compromise bone health over time?Protein needs vary throughout our lifespan. More than enough protein is not necessarily better. Dancers who are adolescents and still growing, as well as engaging in athletic activity several times per week, can estimate protein on the higher end of the range, but shouldn’t over do it. High protein diets can lead to more calcium being lost from the bones – a big problem for dancers who are at higher than average risk for stress fractures. Protein overload = weaker bones. Get your protein from food sources like beans, nuts, seeds, whole grains and if necessary, get small amounts from meat or dairy. Protein supplements or powders are not necessary and can even be dangerous.Dietary sources of bone building nutrients:Everyone knows that dairy is a great source of calcium, but there are other plant-based sources of calcium too, like almonds. If your dairy intake is restricted, choose calcium fortified soy milk, almond milk, or orange juice w/ calcium.Greens: spinach, kale, collards, chardAll fruits (great sources of vitamin C and phytonutrients)Tuna, eggs, beansSunflower seeds, almondsEnriched cereals, oatmeal with almond milkEmily Cook Harrison MS, RD, LD Emily is a registered dietitian and holds both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in nutrition from Georgia State University, USA. Her master’s thesis research was on elite level ballet dancers and nutrition and she has experience providing nutrition services for weight management, sports nutrition, disordered eating, disease prevention, and food allergies. Emily was a professional dancer for eleven years with the Atlanta Ballet and several other companies. She is a dance educator and the mother of two young children. She now runs the Centre for Dance Nutrition and Healthy Lifestyles. She can be reached at emily@dancernutrition.com www.dancernutrition.com Top photo: © Linda Bucklin | Dreamstime.comOne Response to “Bone Health for Dancers”Trackbacks/PingbacksTracie S. says:December 9, 2011 at 1:15 pmThanks for the nutrition advice. Dance Informa always has such helpful content. Keep it coming! .

Articles below are written by Lwigh Schanfein http://www.danceinforma.com/USA_magazine/2013/12/03/injury-prevention-101-stress-fractures-and-spondylolysis/

Leigh Schanfein of Dance Informa.          History and science museums are full of them. Graveyards and memorial grounds are packed with them. Archaeologists study those that have lasted millennia. Bones seem as tough and indelible as stone!   And, while our bones are really hard and give our bodies support and protection, they are made up of living cells that continually build up and break down. Our bones even have blood vessels running through them, carrying oxygen and nutrients to those living cells. Because our bones are in constant flux, they are affected by how we treat our bodies, largely by what we do or do not eat, and by our physical activities.Because our bones are in a constant state of regeneration, if we do not take care of our bodies in healthy ways, we could inadvertently damage our bones.

 

Whenever we do exercise and the muscles pull on our bones, or we do “weight-bearing” activities and our skeleton has to bear the forces of our weight, the bone gets a signal that it needs to be strong to support these activities. This triggers an increase in building up bone and increasing bone density. This is good – dense bone is strong bone! Physical activity, especially weight-bearing activity, promotes bone turnover: first there is break down and then there is even more growth. But bone cannot be made out of thin air. We have to get the components for making bones in our diet. Without them, not only will our bodies not be able to lay adequate amounts of new bone on the old, it also will cause the body to strip bone of these resources so they are available for other important functions elsewhere in the body. One thing that can happen to bones when there is too much demand that cannot be met, either because of too much physical stress or inadequate nutrition, or a combination thereof, is a stress fracture.

 

What is a stress fracture?A stress fracture is a type of fracture, or break, that occurs because we are putting demands on the bone that cannot be met. In other words, the bone is being broken down more quickly than it is being regenerated. Unlike a traumatic fracture, a stress fracture occurs over time with repeated strain and usually doesn’t result in a complete break or displacement of the bone. It can occur in dancers because we are putting great physical demands on our bones both in amount of force and angle of force. It is especially problematic if a dancer is incurring great physical demands in conjunction with inadequate nutrition. Lateral view of lumbar spine with stress fracture on pars interarticularis of the L5 vertebra. Diagram by Leigh Schanfein.

 

How do I know if I have a stress fracture?Stress fractures generally occur slowly over time, so often a dancer might not even know he or she has one until it has progressed to a more serious stage. How much pain someone will experience also depends on the stress fracture location. For example, if the stress fracture is in the tibia, the bone you feel on the front of your shin, it might be very painful with jumping. But, if the stress fracture is in the spine then the dancer might not feel it unless he goes into a huge back extension (backbend) or adds a twist with that bend.Usually the pain will be localized so you can point to exactly where it hurts, it will be over a bone, and there might be swelling and tenderness. A doctor will want to perform some diagnostic tests. Dr. Mamie Air is a physiatry fellow in interventional sports and spine who now treats dancers with more care than she received when she was a dancer! “I may not use an X-ray at all since many dancer patients are young and of reproductive age,” explains Dr. Air. Additionally, “often the X-rays will be normal, particularly if there is only a stress fracture… typically more imaging is needed.” Doctors used to turn to bone scans but now they more often use an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) to diagnose because it doesn’t use radiation and can provide far more detail.

 

How is a stress fracture treated?A stress fracture is one of those injuries that mostly just requires time to heal because the bone will need a while to heal. Dr. Air points out that it’s still a fracture. “Even if the bone has not completely fractured through, and is in the category of a stress reaction or a stress fracture, it is important to prevent it from progressing.” Treatment time depends on how early the stress fracture was detected and how far it has progressed as well as location in the body and what kinds of stresses are put on that bone. Healing can be as long as two to three months with partial or complete rest

 

.Prevention is best – how can I prevent a stress fracture?Something really important in both injury prevention and general health is making sure you get adequate nutrition. This means obtaining all nutrient groups from your diet. Of particular importance for bone health are the minerals that make up bone, including Calcium and Phosphorus, and the vitamins and minerals that assist your body in using them, including Vitamin D, Magnesium and Manganese. Calcium is of the utmost importance and can be found in dairy products, leafy greens and nuts among other sources. Vitamin D is essential for absorption of Calcium in the body and, while it can be found in foods, our best source is the sun. We use energy from the sun to convert molecules already in our bodies into Vitamin D. You dancers who spend hours in the studio should try to get about 15 minutes of sunshine too!Age is a factor in bone health. We can only increase our bone density until about age 30, so you need to be diligent about getting adequate nutrition, especially as a teenager.Even someone with good bone health can get a stress fracture if they put enough repetitive stress on the bone. So, it’s important to pay attention to your body. Give yourself adequate rest. If you begin to experience the pointed pain associated with a stress fracture, see a trusted doctor as soon as possible.

 

What is Spondylolysis?Spondylolysis is a stress fracture in one or more of the vertebrae in the lumbar spine, the bones in your lower back. It is a common stress fracture among young dancers who go into extreme back bends or “whack” their arabesque without using their muscles to properly support and protect the spine. The stress fracture develops on a slender part of the bone that connects the spiney parts that stick out from the round body of the bone. It also happens to be in between where the vertebra articulates or moves in contact with the bone above and below it in the spine, so it is a site of rotational forces. As with any other fracture, “it is important to give your bones the optimum chance at healing. This unfortunately means being ‘shut down’ from all physical activities that could potentially harm this part of the spine.” Dr. Air says it is extremely important not to push through the pain. Surgery is rarely indicated but patients with spondylolysis are typically treated with two to three months rest from physical activity, which could include wearing a back brace to prevent back extension. Fortunately though, “rehabilitation typically occurs when the pain has stopped, and a dancer is recommended to begin a gradual physical therapy plan, particularly focused on core strength,” graduating to dance-like movements once he/she is strong enough to do so. Keep Dr. Air’s advice in mind: “[Do] not push through the pain, seek consultation early if it is not getting better, discuss with your doctor the appropriate imaging test, take the advice to ‘rest’ very seriously (anticipate 2-3 months off dancing and performing), and then gradually get back into a graded rehabilitation plan.” It is also extremely important to figure out why the stress fracture occurred in the first place. Are you getting adequate nutrition? Is your caloric intake in line with your expenditure? Is your technique or choreography causing you to repetitively stress one part of the spine? Is the musculature supporting your torso weak? Speak with a trusted physician about your concerns to help you stay healthy so you can dance at your best!

 

For more information, read this great article about Bone Health for Dancers:www.danceinforma.com/USA_magazine/2011/12/03/bone-health-for-dancersDr. Mamie Air is a physiatry fellow in interventional sports and spine at New York City’s Hospital for Special Surgery. Photo (top): © Zafi123 | Dreamstime.comAll material included in Dance Informa is provided in good faith. It is derived from sources believed to be accurate and current as at the date of publishing. Dance Informa does not take responsibility for any information deemed to be incorrect. Always check with your doctor if you think you may have a health issue.Leave a Reply Name (required) Mail (will not be published) (required) WebsitePopularLatestCommentsTagsSubscribeCelebrity Dance Competitions expand in 2014Dancing for Theme ParksWhy Do I Have to Take Ballet?Love Letter to a Legend: One Dancer’s Film Tribute to Dan WagonerLet Me Hear Your Body Talk - What You Say Without A WordFINDCompetitions & ConventionsDance Studios & ClassesSuppliersDancewearTeachersChoreographersDance CompaniesDance Jobs Send link to FriendSend this article to a friend!Friend EmailEnter your messageEnter below security codeI'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. I’m a great place for you to tell a story and let your users know a little more about you.

By Laura Di Orio.Becoming a professional dancer is like building a house from the ground up. You can’t start by adding the roof and interior decorations; rather, you must start by creating a solid foundation to support the structure and make it last. Similarly, a dancer must establish that foundation in technique before adding all the “tricks” and performance quality.

 

And that foundation, according to many dance teachers and professionals in the field, is ballet.“Because ballet has been constantly evolving for over 400 years, it has arrived at a very solid method of developing human movement potential for the stage,” says Stephen Pier, director of the Dance Division at The Hartt School of the University of Hartford, located in Connecticut.“It’s still the most relevant technical training all around and can serve as a very effective way of organizing and developing the facility of the dancer. Most other techniques or styles have not been around that long. They are too limited to be the sole basis of training, and they haven’t worked out the science and art of dancing to the depth that ballet has.”All of Pier’s students are required to take daily ballet class during their four years at Hartt. Ballet has proven to inform their dancing, and students have gone on to work in a vast range of professional companies – from Paul Taylor and Joffrey Ballet, to downtown contemporary and Las Vegas.Like Pier, Dawn Hillen, master ballet teacher who currently teaches in NYC at Steps on Broadway, Broadway Dance Center and Ballet Arts, stresses the importance of ballet as a foundation of training.

 

She says even her non-ballet-focused students have benefited. Some of her students who first started in hip-hop and found ballet later, for instance, said they felt definite improvement in their ability to change weight quickly, hit clean lines faster, focus and stay in the moment, and they became physically and mentally stronger.Dawn Hillen leads a ballet class at Broadway Dance Center. Photo by Fiamma Piacentini Huff.“You can use ballet to refine yourself,” Hillen says. “It creates a dancer or performer who is centered, balanced, lengthened and physically graceful.

 

Just standing up is an art form, and it is a big part of your first impression. There have been a number of pre-professionals who were not getting work, and once they added ballet training to their daily or weekly routines, they began getting callbacks and jobs.”Ballet contributes more to a dancer than just refined technique, too. Pier says ballet also imparts skills like “attention to detail, mastery, form, harmony, precision, discipline, social grace and awareness of the group – all skills that help young people succeed in the adult world.”In addition, Yuka Kawazu, who has been teaching ballet in NYC for 15 years at various studios, including Ballet Arts and Broadway Dance Center, says, “We learn so many things, like patience, discipline, a different language, how to breathe, and we share joyful moments with other dancers.”For these reasons, it is probably best to introduce ballet early on in a dancer’s training, to establish these skills in his/her dance and life. “If you really have the dancer’s best interest at heart, you must offer a proper ‘diet’ of training, and ballet is a big part of that good ‘diet,’” says Pier. “Not everyone is going to like broccoli if they’re used to eating candy all the time, but you might find some great recipes for serving it more tastefully.”Still, some students may complain that ballet is “boring” or that learning the basics of technique is “slow.”

 

In actuality, however, ballet is rigorous and demanding and a practice that requires great physical and mental control. To change a dancer’s approach from ballet as “boring” to ballet as “interesting” or “enjoyable,” Pier suggests taking a look at that dancer’s passion. Perhaps he/she is more focused on jazz. Then how can ballet support that passion, and what does ballet have in common with that passion?Yuka Kawazu corrects a young dancer in her ballet class. Photo courtesy of Yuka Kawazu.“Sometimes it’s good to show them how many successful artists in that field have studied ballet,” Pier says. “I like to point out in ballet class how different steps or phrases or movements relate to other dance techniques that I know a student is really turned on by.”Similarly, as a teacher, Hillen says that when students come to her with the “ballet is boring” attitude, she tries to discover what they want, what they value and what drives them, and then she connects ballet to that. “The dancer can use this same approach on themselves to link up what they love with what they may need to do that, at first, seems ‘boring’,” Hillen adds. “Ask yourself what you want and what you like and how ballet is actually a means to creating those things.”Many of Kawazu’s students are young Broadway professionals, and she says they have all come to realize the importance of ballet training to their career. Her teenage students have performed on Broadway inFinian’s Rainbow, Mary Poppins, Billy Elliot, Beauty and the Beast, Evita, Once, The Little Mermaid and more. Kawazu says she has had students who didn’t want to take ballet but should of in order to better their performing career. “I tell them that it’s okay to make a lot of mistakes and then they’ll learn,” she continues.

 

“I mix between trying to make ballet fun and teaching more seriously. I would like them to feel that they can get better when they repeat the same exercises a few times. And when they hold their balance or can do the step, I see their face glow. I love that moment!”In today’s dance world, where dancers are expected to be versatile, it probably doesn’t hurt every dancer, regardless of his/her concentration, to explore other dance forms. But it is the old tradition of ballet that seems to make the difference between dancer and professional.

 

“Ballet is the ‘grandmother’ of them all in the Western world,” Pier says. “This system has evolved over centuries and has survived and absorbed every fad imaginable. It has great wisdom and logic imbedded in it, which every dancer should learn about. It’s not important whether or not you think you will become a ballet dancer. It is very important, however, that you become educated about your art and respect all of its various practices and practitioners.”

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