1. What bed should I sleep in? This is a question I am often asked by people with back and leg pain. I don’t know why this question is never discussed in our textbooks, is it not important? It is only in recent years that I have started to pay attention to this issue from my personal feelings. When I was young, what kind of bed I slept in was hardly a problem at all. When I was in college, my bed was almost a sheet on a wooden board, and I still slept sweetly. But after the age of 35, my back began to pick the bed; after the age of 40, I am almost not used to sleeping in any bed outside the home. Whenever I encounter a hard mattress, I feel that my back is suspended and I wake up in the middle of the night with pain. So I thought of my patients. As the old saying goes, “Patients with lumbar disc herniation should sleep on a hard bed”, both doctors and patients say this, and I don’t know where it comes from. In the past, when I didn’t have any experience, I just said, “Go sleep on a flat bed!” The more I think about it, the more I think it’s not right. “A normal lumbar spine people sleep hard bed are difficult, so that those patients with back pain can not move in a hard bed how to survive? 2, choose a mattress in line with the physiological curvature of our spine is a physiological curvature, in line with the physiological curvature, the joints of the spine and the muscles next to the vertebrae will be in a relaxed and labor-saving state. When we sleep on a hard board, due to the lack of lumbar support, on the one hand, the muscles of the lumbar region must continue to work to maintain the curvature of the lumbar spine, over time it is inevitable that fatigue; on the other hand, the lumbar spine will certainly be due to the lack of support and change in the physiological curvature, over time the small joints of the lumbar spine will produce fatigue and lead to lumbago. When we were young, we could sleep on a hard bed because the joints and ligaments in our lumbar region were very soft at that time, and the ability to adjust was very strong, so it was not uncomfortable. But when our lumbar spine degenerates and ages, the ligaments and joints become stiff, the adjustment ability is greatly reduced, and the discomfort becomes more and more obvious. Low back pain patients this adjustment ability is even worse, poor mattress will even aggravate the patient’s symptoms. “What kind of bed is suitable for you?” Different people may have different answers. But we still have two suggestions for this: do not sleep on a hard bed; the mattress that has been used for more than 10 years, sleeping down as if in a hammock makes the lumbar spine bowed like a shrimp kind is also better to change. We need a medium hardness of the mattress, sleep down when the mattress should give the lumbar a support, so that the lumbar spine is not suspended and maintain its physiological curvature. 3, which position sleep lumbar not tired? If you are used to sleep flat, you can put a large pillow under both knees, so that the knee joint flexion, which can further relax the lumbar muscles, thereby reducing the pressure between the lumbar discs, and can reduce the tension of the nerve roots and relieve lumbar pain. If you are used to sleep on your side, you should pay attention to the height of the pillow is enough to keep the neck and the rest of the spine at the same level, while moderately flexing the knees and hips so that the lumbar vertebrae gently bowed, and a pillow between the legs to make the hip balance is also more comfortable. We do not recommend prone sleep, which will increase the stress between the small joints of the lumbar spine and aggravate lumbar pain, and the cervical spine will always be twisted and problems. Mattress problem is like the problem of shoes, is really a very personalized problem, you may want to put more effort in the choice of mattress, try more. What is a good mattress? A mattress that allows you to sleep the whole night and not feel back pain in the morning is a good mattress!