Back Pain Treatment Options

Pain is both a physical and emotional experience caused by real or potential injury or damage to the body. It is often best described as a complex three-way warning system. First, acute pain warns of injury. Second, pain warns against further injury by causing the body's movements to withdraw from the source of injury. Finally, a pain warning leads to a period of reduced activity, enabling injuries to heal more efficiently.

Pain is often difficult to measure because the severity of the pain does not always reflect the severity of the injury. Some people feel extreme pain from relatively small injuries, while others show little or no pain even after suffering a severe injury. Pain can also be present even though no injury is apparent, or pain can linger long after an injury appears to have healed.

Communicate with Your Doctor

Since each person perceives pain a little differently, and responds to pain differently, it is essential that you communicate as much about the exact nature of your pain to medical professionals, including the location, quality and intensity of your pain. Include in your communication the mechanics of the pain:

• How did the pain start?
• How long have you had this pain?
• What kinds of activities make the pain better or worse?
• Is it better or worse when you walk, sit, stand, or lie down?

Therapies with Medicine

The complexity of human pain often requires a combination of pain therapies with medicine and without medicine to achieve relief. In addition to the body's own mechanisms, humans have devised many different ways to manipulate the body's ability to control pain. Drugs that relieve pain, known as analgesics, usually interfere with pain impulse transmission in the nervous system. Narcotic analgesics, such as codeine, have chemical structures that are similar to the pain-blocking neuro-transmitter endorphin.

Other drugs that relieve pain alter the way damaged nerves transmit information. Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, such as aspirin and ibuprofen, are analgesics that reduce pain by inhibiting the synthesis of prostaglandins, the body chemicals that intensify pain and cause inflammation.

Medications prescribed by a physician may be used alone or in combination with other medications and can be administered in a variety of ways.

When Surgery is Required

When conservative treatments, such as medication or physical therapy, don't help, back surgery may offer relief. But it doesn't help every type of back pain. In fact, back surgery is needed in only a small percentage of cases and is usually reserved for treating chronic pain as when a nerve is pinched, the spinal cord is compressed or there is too much movement between the vertebrae.

Traditionally, back surgery was one of the most grueling and damaging surgical procedures a patient could endure. Now, through the utilization of cutting edge technology, patients can undergo many back and spine operations as outpatient procedures. These alternatives to traditional back surgeries allow for great precision, faster healing, and less damage to healthy tissue.

Traditional open back surgery employs large incisions and can dissect multiple levels of tissue and muscle to view the spine. Modern procedures that are less invasive use a combination of surgical and technological innovations to repair spinal conditions while minimizing the disturbance to surrounding healthy tissue.

Consider all options

Before considering any back surgery, it is important to undertake a considerable amount of research. Back and leg pain can be a complex issue that may possibly require multiple opinions on diagnosis and treatment. It is important to choose these opinions and your spine surgeon in Chennai wisely.

The Successful Resolution of Mechanical Low Back Pain (and other disorders of the body)

This article will explain to you the principles that lie behind the successful resolution of mechanical low back pain (and other disorders). They are a series of logical simple to understand steps that underpin successful treatment practice and effective exercise prescription. Learn more about the low back pain from our best neurosurgeon in Chennai.

DIAGNOSIS

The first step is diagnosing what the problem is. This is done by doctors and therapists basically using two methods. The first one being what the patient says or complains of and the second being what is actually found by the practitioner from their physical examination.

Both of these are vital suppliers of information for a correct diagnosis. The sum total of all the information gleaned from both methods should build a picture of the exact problem that leads on to the diagnosis.

Sometimes it is possible to ascertain an EXACT diagnosis and other times it is not. Having an exact diagnosis is desirable but not absolutely essential to successful treatment. What is important is that the existence or absence of certain conditions is ascertained so that the correct treatment and advice can be followed.

In the case of back pain it is important to be able to put the cause of the pain down to a mechanical problem affecting the back. With reference to back pain there are certain conditions from other body systems that give pain in the back and these must be ruled out before treatment of the back can begin

PAIN RESOLUTION

Before normal movement and function can be looked at the aspect of pain must be considered. This is because in the initial stages of an episode of back pain the pain is there to prevent further damage occurring. It is important that this pain is allowed to settle and further damage is not caused. A few days of the CORRECT rest is normally sufficient to achieve this. Longer than this and there are likely to be more negative effects than positive from resting unless a specific reason is given by a qualified medical person. There are modalities that are helpful in resolving pain such as medication and electrotherapy that can be beneficial.

MOVEMENT RE EDUCATION

The next stage is the regaining of the normal amount of movement in the back. This is the stage at which most problems occur. This is normally for a number of common reasons. These generally revolve around the fact that there is a degree of overlap between the pain stage and this stage and people are unsure of when to begin moving, which specific movements to do, how many to do and for how long.

It is here that is so often the KEY CRITICAL POINT in the recovery process because with the CORRECT ADVICE INSTRUCTION AND ENCOURAGEMENT regarding movement and exercise therapy most back pain can be improved. If this point is missed problems begin and little by little get bigger and more difficult to resolve until ultimately if left long enough, which often can be just a matter of weeks, you can become a chronic back pain patient, with all its associated problems.

STRENGTH RE EDUCATION

The next stage once the movement is well on the way to recovery is the re education of the muscles that control the area. Here again the skill is knowing when to begin the exercises, which ones to do, how many and for how long. With the back you may be lucky and be able to resume your normal everyday activities without needing any specific strengthening exercises. There are however great many people with low back pain who would be so much better and be much more able with again the CORRECT EXERCISE PRESCRIPTION. For some it would undoubtedly totally solve their problem.

NORMAL FUNCTION ACTIVITY RESUMATION

Following the successful resolution of pain, movement and strength all these three come together to allow the patient to resume their normal everyday activities. Here again the key is the skilful and correct advice as to how much how soon. If the previous three stages have been addressed properly this stage will follow naturally but the correct advice is paramount in preventing re injury.

SUMMARY

So there we have it. The basic stages behind the successful resolution of mechanical low back pain. This can essentially be transferred to many other musculo skeletal problems. Although in black and white it appears relatively simple do not confuse something being simple and think it means it is unskilled. It requires specific knowledge at each of the particular stages.

In fact I would go as far as to say categorically how important it is to get as far as possible a definitive diagnosis of your problem before engaging in any form of therapy whether by a third party or self help.

Advantages And Risks Of A Spine Surgery

As people grow older, they often tend to be more vulnerable to more kinds of sicknesses. This is quite understandable taking into consideration that people's health conditions drop as their age increases. 

One of the sicknesses that not a few people may come across during their old ages often turns out to be the one related to their back or spine. As they grow older, back ache or spine ache becomes very common for them to suffer from. 

This is when they will understand how important a spine surgery is. However, prior to making up their mind to undergo a surgery for spine with best spine surgeon in chennai, it is wise to consider what advantages and risks that a spine surgery may offer or cost them.

When people speak of a spine surgery, it is pretty common to be aware of the pain that it can have as an effect on the patients. Normally, a surgery in spine will include surgical cuts here and there on the patients' body parts. As a result of that, the patients will often have permanent scars left on their body. Of course, this is not good at all but it is a risk people will have to face in case they are up for the these surgery.

In addition to that, a spine surgery will often require the prospective patients to take out quite a massive amount of the patients' hard earned money out of their pockets, all at the same time. At this point of time, most patients will have been able to see that so far, they seem to have everything to lose. While they will have to bear the painful feelings the these surgery may cause them, they also have to spend so much money that they have earned hard enough just to pay for their monthly allowances.

Yet, as a matter of fact, it is not a spine surgery does not have any advantages at all either. Otherwise, it would not have been invented in the first place. A spine surgery is always able to offer advantage in that it can heal the spine ache patients quickly. With that being said, the patients are not quite likely to spend too much money to pay for the hospital fees charged while they are staying at the hospitals.

Better yet, with the more modern spine surgery method, that is, the laser spine surgery, things seem to be a whole lot easier. A laser surgery will least likely cause the patients to feel a considerable pain, if at all. This way, the patients can have more peace in mind.

However, both the conventional and the modern spine surgery techniques have one advantage in common. They both offer the ability for the patients to recover more quickly.