Were You Born Preterm? Your Muscles May Still Have More to Learn!

The theme for this week … the implications on adult well-being from being born premature

Being born preterm sounds like a rare occurrence. In reality about 10% of you were born early and research shows that can relate to some long-term health implications. The good news is that being physically active is a great antidote to nearly all of these conditions. Read on …

If you were born preterm …

Since the 1980s more preterm babies survived and are now in their 40s and 50s. If you were one of these babies, there are a number of health impacts to be aware of and to be more proactive about.

What does ‘preterm’ mean?

Any baby born before 37 weeks gestation is considered to be preterm. There are further breakdowns as follows:

• Late preterm is 34-37 weeks
• Moderate preterm is 32-34 weeks
• Very preterm is 28-32 weeks
• Extremely preterm is under 28 weeks

Statistically about 10% of annual births in the US are preterm. From a numbers standpoint this is huge — about 384,000 in 2021!

What are the health implications?

The paper “An overview of adult health outcomes after preterm birth” published in 2022 discusses groups of preterm babies at varying ages, studied in several countries. Sweden is common for several of the analyses. The most common health issues noted are increased risk for:

• Diabetes
• Respiratory challenges
• Cardiovascular disease
• Kidney disease
• Lipid level regulation

Coincidentally, these are all conditions where physical activity is consistently shown to have a positive impact. There is hope!

How can Bridging® play a role?

What we’ve seen at the Bridging® Institute is that our clients want to move. They are willing to try a different approach to being active so they can feel better and do more. Even when the cause of the movement challenge stems from early in life, Bridging® can help.

Clients find Bridging’s targeted approach to problem-solving finds issues that matter and that other professionals don’t think to look for. Even better is the gentle, rocking, and stretch-based way muscles are reset during Bridging®, which is often relaxing.

This week’s video session guest was born two months early, a very preterm baby. She has had back pain which is still present despite trying many traditional and alternative approaches to find relief. We used a developmental approach with Bridging and got new results.

With less pain she can be more active!