McLean, Virginia, Luna employs physical therapists specializing in treating patients with diastasis recti after pregnancy. With effective strategies and a tailored exercise plan, women with diastasis recti can correct the condition once and for all, returning to the activities and life that they love.
Best of all, with Luna, patients can receive physical therapy for diastasis recti in the comfort of their homes. Our physical therapists come to you — it’s physical therapy, delivered.
Diastasis recti is also known as abdominal separation. It occurs when the space between the left and right abdominal muscles are separated by more than 2.7 cm. Typically, the condition is only present in pregnant women and newborns, especially premature newborns.
Though the condition usually isn’t painful or life-threatening, it can lead to greater complications, including chronic low back, pelvic, or hip pain, constipation, and urinary incontinence. It can also make additional pregnancies more difficult, as it weakens the abdominal muscles.
For this reason, most patients with this condition wish to correct it. Fortunately, it’s never too late to do so — and it doesn’t require surgery, just strict adherence to a personalized physical therapy regimen.
Source: BabyCenter
Diastasis recti is caused by excessive pressure in the abdominal muscles, typically as the result of pregnancy. During pregnancy, the abdominal muscles and surrounding connective tissue are stretched by the uterus. At the same time, pregnancy hormones such as relaxin and estrogen relax the muscles and allow them to be stretched even further.
When newborn babies have diastasis recti, it’s almost always because they were born premature and their abdominal muscles didn’t have time to fully develop. In most of these cases the condition will correct itself with time.
The most common causes of diastasis recti include: