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Wednesday, January 15, 2025

Helix Fitness “Stumbles” Onto A Breakthrough Cure for Chronic Pain Plaguing One in Four Adults

Last updated Wednesday, May 10, 2023 11:57 ET , Source: Helix Fitness

Lateral training, an internationally patented technology originally developed by Helix as a more efficient cardio modality, has now been proven to reduce chronic knee pain.

Boston, Massachusetts, 05/10/2023 / SubmitMyPR /

Boston-based fitness start up Helix Fitness invented and patented “lateral training” technology in 2008. It was designed for purpose-built cardio machines for gyms and elite athletes. The company’s lateral trainers have been subsequently utilized by major professional sports teams like the LA Lakers, New England Patriots and Cleveland Cavaliers and sold to gym franchises and via home fitness dealers worldwide.

The technology was invented by fitness industry pioneer and competitive cyclist Lenny Snyderman, now CEO of Helix Fitness. Snyderman knew that traditional cardio machines (treadmills, steppers, bikes, and ellipticals) and daily life activities like walking or climbing stairs only work the body in a single plane of motion and thus focus their efforts on the fronts and backs of the lower body only.

By incorporating a lateral motion, the body is forced to recruit more muscles, including the crucial muscles on the sides of the body, such as the gluteus medius, vital to knee health, and the obliques, critical for pelvis stability and balance. Snyderman, who holds 11 patents on lateral training, says that the company’s technology is the only cardio equipment that allows people to work in all three planes or dimensions of human motion.

After it introduced its new lateral trainers, Helix quickly became aware that the very quality that made its proprietary technology attractive to elite athletes—namely, that the sideways figure 8 motion activates parts of the body other cardio completely ignores—also uniquely positioned the technology to help prevent and cure chronic knee and hip pain from a variety of causes such as age, arthritis, injury or overuse. The company recruited a heavy-hitting medical advisory board made up of orthopedists and sports medicine experts and conducted a decade of clinical studies on lateral training and its impact on the body.

“Based on initial studies, we knew that lateral trainers were more effective cardio than everything else on the market. But very quickly after our launch, we started hearing from physical therapists, orthopedic surgeons and general customers. People told us that they’d struggled with knee or hip pain sometimes for years, and that our products ‘cured’ it in a couple of weeks. We heard from people who’d had surgery or tried pills, shots and acupuncture, but never found relief until using our products. We knew we had to investigate it further,” says Snyderman.

While Helix continues to produce its successful cardio products, it has pivoted to produce therapy-specific products as well, marketing therapeutic products under the Helix® brand as well as knee and hip therapy-specific products designed for the home consumer or the physical therapy clinic (Scoop® Lateral Trainer and TheraScoop™ Lateral Trainer).

The market for knee pain is enormous. Around one in four adults worldwide suffer from chronic and sometimes debilitating knee pain, with the number of sufferers growing as the population ages. In an attempt to address this pain, Americans spend billions annually, including $1.1 billion on fish oil supplements clinically shown effective only for 1% of knee pain sufferers and $721 million each year on glucosamine, a “joint pain relief supplement” found no more effective than a placebo in multiple clinical studies.

“Due to today’s more sedentary lifestyles and the fact that our population is aging, knee pain is a major and growing health problem—it impacts one in four people, reducing their quality of life and their ability to stay as active as they want as they age,” says Snyderman. “We can now say with confidence that lateral training has significant effects in combating this pain. It’s a major breakthrough that doesn’t involve drugs or surgery. In fact, the only side effects of lateral training are being fitter, healthier and looking and feeling better.”

Media contact:

Name: Lisey Good

Email: [email protected]

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