How to Improve Stability and Prevent Falls

For better balance, which is an automatic reflex, we have to improve on our stability, thereby preventing falls. Gradual changes linked to growing older—such as weak or inflexible muscles, slower reflexes, and worsening eyesight—affect the sense of balance. Certain health problems—such as inner ear disorders, neuropathy, and heart rhythm disturbances—may upset balance, too. So, can alcohol and many medications.

A step-by-step instruction for easy, effective workouts that will improve posture, increase muscle strength and speed, sharpen reflexes, expand flexibility, and firm your core. With practice, almost anyone can achieve better balance. Strong legs and flexible ankles help prevent falls and allow you to catch yourself if you do trip. as we age, ability to know where you are in space, called proprioception, gets worse, which contributes to a decline in balance.

Examples of balance exercises include:

• Shifting your weight from side to side
• Standing on one foot
• Walking heel to toe
• Using a balance board or stability ball
• Doing tai chi, yoga or Pilates.

Doing three to six balance training sessions per week, with four balance exercises per training session, for 11 to 12 weeks was effective in improving people’s balance, from a study report.

Precautions:

1. Make sure you have something close to you that you can hold on to if you start to fall during the exercise, to prevent injury.
2. If you use equipment such as a stability board, you should make sure you are on a flat, stable and non-slippery surface.
3. Let the process be gradual.