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Your Back Pain May Not Be Your Back at All!
What Is Sacroiliac Dysfunction?
Your Back Pain May Not Be Your Back at All!
Symptoms include pain in the buttocks or might mimic sciatic nerve pain. Many people come in and say, “My back and hips hurt.” What most people refer to as “hips” are called the sacroiliac joints. They connect the base of the spine to the pelvis. They are important joint as they are at the base of your spine. If you look in the mirror and see two little indentions at the top of your hips just under your lower back and right at your belt line, those are the sacroiliac (SI) joints. If you feel you are walking with a hitch or restriction, this is usually caused by misaligned sacroiliac joints. This can be seen by one leg being shorter than the other.
Lie face-down and have someone put your heels together and look at your feet to see if one leg is longer than the other. Also look at the wear patterns on your shoe or boot soles. Uneven patterns might be related to the foot, but misaligned hips can alter the way you walk as well. Stop reading right now, and look at the heel of your shoe. Sacroiliac problems rarely show up on an MRI and so are commonly missed by doctors, but if left untreated, arthritis and chronic inflammation create continued pain. SI joint dysfunction can occur due to years of muscle imbalance or postural strains. Many pregnant women develop problems that can last well after pregnancy, usually due to abnormal strain on the pelvis and a hormone, called “relaxing,” that releases in the body to tell the ligaments of the pelvis to loosen up and prepare for delivery. The ligaments might never fully regain supportive properties at the sacroiliac joint.
Effective Treatment for Sacroiliac Dysfunction
Joint manipulation by a trained chiropractor • Muscle balance treatments to improve postural strains • Natural anti-inflammatory such as Boswellia, turmeric, or hot packs • Electrical stimulation • Muscle balance therapy • Core and pelvic strengthening • Sacroiliac braces
Call the office today to schedule your appointment! Make sure and tell the receptionist you want to come in for the New Patient special and mention the blog so that you can get your major discount!
Suffering from Chronic Pain?
What Is Facet Joint Syndrome?
Symptoms include general localized pain, a tight locked-up sensation, and dull ache. There is a high probability of chronic dysfunction if not treated. Often these joint dysfunctions occur in whiplash injuries of the neck, as well as lifting injuries of the lower and upper back.
The facet joints can be thought of as hinges of a door, preventing excessive motion, over-twisting, or toppling over. The segments of the spine are stabilized by a number of structures that allow the flexibility needed to bend forward or backward and to twist. It is not uncommon to develop misalignments of the facet joints in the lower back, causing or referring pain in the buttocks or other regions of the back. In the neck, it can refer pain to the shoulders, upper back, and even the base of your skull.
In the anatomy field, there is a fundamental physiological principle called “Hilton’s Law.” It is the principle that the nerve supplying a joint also supplies both the muscles that move the joint. If the joint is not moving properly or is misaligned, it will be giving no signal or abnormal signals to the muscles that support that joint. This is why spinal manipulation works so well. If the joint is not moving or is misaligned, it can cause the supporting muscles to atrophy or weaken. You must first restore proper joint motion before strengthening so you get proper signals from the nerve to the joint. When your spinal joints are not moving at all, or not moving properly, that now creates extra workload on the muscles of the back and, nine times out of 10, creates trigger points in the muscles, or localized muscle spasms.
SUCCESS CASE STUDY
Susan is a 37-year-old homemaker and mother of four. She was having sharp pain in her back that in certain movements “catches” and won’t let go. She was unable to lift her youngest child for fear of her lower back catching. She had not been taking any medication because she feels there is something mechanically wrong and that medication will not change that but only cover up her problem. After careful examination, it was determined that Susan had severe facet joint syndrome. Just as she suspected—and a women’s intuition is usually right—she had developed a marked increase in curvature of her lower back, irritating her joints, causing severe misalignments and, in certain movements, bringing marked pain. This condition did not occur overnight and, likewise, treatment consisted of 24 sessions of joint realignment via manipulation, along with muscle balance therapy. I am happy to report she ended treatment 100-percent pain-free in all planes of motion.
Effective Treatment for Facet Joint Syndrome
Joint manipulation by a trained chiropractor • Muscle balance treatments to improve postural strains • Core exercises • Natural anti-inflammatory such as Boswellia, turmeric, and hot packs • Electrical stimulation
If you are suffering from chronic joint pain, give us a call and let us help you get back to feeling like yourself with safe and proven effective treatments.
What Is Spinal Subluxation?
What Is Spinal Subluxation?
Symptoms include general localized pain, a tight locked-up sensation, dull ache, lack of mobility when bending or rotating the back or neck, sharp pain, catching sensation, and stabbing pain in the neck, upper back, or lower back.
Vertebral, or spinal, subluxation is a partial dislocation or misalignment of one or more joints in the spine. Subluxations can cause abnormal wear-and-tear of the joint, abnormal musculature, decreased range of motion, decreased nerve function, and pain. Prolonged subluxations lead to severe degeneration, known as subluxation degeneration. One might also develop loss of proper curvatures of the spine, which creates abnormal wear-and-tear of the spine and puts unwanted stress on muscles. Some muscles might get tight or overdeveloped, and others could weaken and shrink.
This subluxation complex, meaning multiple misaligned vertebrae, can contribute to other health problems, the most obvious being back or neck pain. Other less obvious symptoms might be dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system, which controls your organs.
Subluxations can irritate spinal nerves. To understand the importance of the nerves that are extensions of your spinal cord, think about all the different types of vehicles on the highway—trucks, cars, buses, motorcycles—each going to a specific destination to do a special or unique thing. Your nerve impulses act in the same way, traveling the superhighway of your brain, spinal cord, nerve root, all the way to the tiniest nerve in your fingers, toes, organs, and systems of the entire body. They are all traveling at a proper speed and certain function, as long as there is no interference.
Improper position of spinal bones or vertebrae, overuse, and injuries can cause interference of the nervous system highway, causing too much or too little movement of nerve impulse. As mentioned before, you can develop nerve pain such as numbness, tingling, or sharp shooting pain, and might not be getting 100 percent of the signals to other organs of your body. Take, for example, a tree; if there is problem in the roots of the tree, everything from the trunk to the limbs, which are not getting proper nutrients, will slowly starve or become less healthy than the rest of the tree. In simpler terms, if you kink a water hose, it slows the outpouring of water. When dealing with the nerve signals that control every organ in the body, you want 100 percent of nerve function going to every organ and cell of that organ. Vital organs include your thyroid that controls metabolism, intestinal function, and many other organs. There are ways to measure the amount of signals coming from spinal nerves, to test if they are functioning at optimal levels. This is why so many people maintain strict weekly, bi-monthly, or monthly regular chiropractic care. They have decided not to wait for a problem to arise and are taking a proactive approach to their health. We call this “wellness care.”
Subluxations might occur from repetitive abnormal motion at work, sitting too long in the recliner, old accidents and injuries, emotional trauma and chemical trauma or, in most cases, a combination of all of the previously mentioned.
Effective Treatment for Spinal Subluxation
Joint realignment or manipulation by a trained chiropractor • Muscle balance treatments to improve postural strains
Call Today to schedule your Appointment. Let us help you get back to feeling normal! 325-695-9355
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Are Sharp Stabbing or Grabbing Pain Stopping You in Your Tracks?
What Are Muscle Spasms?
Acute symptoms include severe sharp stabbing or grabbing pain that can stop you in your tracks or bring you to your knees. Chronic muscle spasms can be deep, dull, and unrelenting pain.
Muscle spasm pain can be a primary source of pain but often accompanies other conditions, such as joint misalignments, degenerative disc disease, or bulging discs, sometimes overlooked by medical professionals. You must work to solve the underlying problem if the underlying problem is causing the muscle spasm.
The muscles in your back are large and powerful. Muscle spasms can be categorized as chronic muscle spasms, which often includes what most patients describe as “my back is always so tight.” Chronic muscle spasms are usually due to chronic repetitive strains from work demands or postural strains. The longer the muscles are stuck in a spasm or chronically tight, the increased risk of damage to your vertebrae, disc, and nerve function.
Acute muscle spasm usually occurs due to acute injuries, such as a whiplash injury, weekend warrior sports injuries, or lifting injuries. Sometimes you have torn connective tissue in your spine or the muscle itself, and the tightness is the muscle trying to protect itself. If acute injuries and muscle spasms are not treated properly, these muscles have a high probability of turning into chronic spasms, tightness, and pain.
SUCCESS CASE STUDY
Dan is a 40-year-old athlete who competes in marathons and triathlons…and will challenge you to a foot race if you look at him the wrong way. He trains hard and takes very good care of himself. He entered the clinic with pain in his lower back that limited his ability to stand in an upright position. He states that he just got off a 10-mile bike ride and started to jog when, after four steps, he had sudden severe lower back pain that brought him to a crawl. X-rays were taken, and he had no structural evidence of fractures, arthritis, or disc bulges. He did, however, have several misaligned vertebrae in his lower back, as well as severe muscle spasms in his lower back and hip flexor region, in a muscle called the “psoas.” He had severe muscle imbalances in the hip flexor muscle, a muscle that attaches to the hip and lower back—it is responsible for bending your upper leg or flexing your upper leg toward your waist. This muscle was so tight after riding his bike that where the hip flexor muscle, or the psoas, was still very short and tight, it created a tug-of-war with the muscle in the lower back—and the muscles in the lower back lost. He had a quick recovery, as I expected. Being the competitive athlete, he never missed an appointment, was at the clinic early, and stayed late, always wanting to know more about how to treat his back. After a short six weeks, he was back to running and has learned to stretch his hip flexors often. He has added weekly chiropractic visits to his routine and has not had another back problem for two years and counting.
Effective Treatment for Muscle Spasms
Joint realignment or joint manipulation • Muscle balance therapy • Electrical muscle stimulation to ease muscle pain • Soft tissue manual therapies • Magnesium supplementation to help relax muscles
Just like Dan and hundreds of others we can help you get back to you every day life pain free!
Call us today and ask for our new patient special!
PS. Download you copy of my latest book or stop by the office and pick up a copy.
What Is Degenerative Disc Disease?
What Is Degenerative Disc Disease?
Symptoms usually include dull ache or pain traveling across the lower back, stiffness, and catching sensation in lower back. Upper back or neck degenerative disc disease can happen in any region of your spine. Degenerative disc is a condition in which the disc or cushion between your vertebrae start to break down, usually having been damaged at some point in your life. As they wear out they can create abnormal movement in the spine and send abnormal signals to the supporting muscles, leading to muscle imbalance, dysfunction, and pain.
These changes are more likely to occur in people who do heavy physical work, such as repeated heavy lifting. A previous sudden (acute) injury, such as a fall, leading to a herniated disc might also begin the degeneration process. Those old injuries you might have not given a second thought to sometimes come back to haunt you.
Some studies correlate a genetic relationship to degenerative changes, so be sure and thank your parents if you have this condition. As the space between the vertebrae gets smaller, there is less padding between them, which creates bone on bone and the spine becomes less stable. The body reacts to this by constructing bony growths, called “bone spurs” (osteophytes). Bone spurs can put pressure on the spinal nerves or spinal cord, resulting in pain and affecting nerve function.
If degenerative changes in the bones occur in your upper back, you might develop a slumped or hunched appearance of your back. We have all seen men or women who have humped appearance, loss of height, and permanent postural abnormalities. This might be where we get the term “little old lady.” If this has occurred, you are in advanced stages of degenerative disc disease and need to take action now to prevent further postural changes. If someone in your family—a mother, father, or grandparent—has this, it is possible you have a genetic predisposition for the same condition.
SUCCESS CASE STUDY
Tim is a 70-year-old retired geologist. He was diagnosed in 1999 with degenerative disc in his lower back. He says he had occasional back pain but had always been able to work through it, until one day while playing golf he had tremendous lower back pain that was unrelenting for three weeks. He took high levels of pain killers and muscle relaxers with no relief. Hunched over and using a walker, he lunged onto my examination table. X-rays showed he had Stage 3 degenerative disc disease (DDD) at L4-L5 and L5-S1. After physical examination it was clear he also had severe muscle imbalances in his hip flexor muscles and lower back musculature. He said his number-one goal was to return to the golf course and that he would do anything it took to get back to swinging a golf club. Our treatment consisted of computerized lumbar decompression therapy, lower back joint realignments, a heavy dose of muscle balancing therapy, and electrical stimulation treatment. After four weeks he was 80-percent improved. He is now back on the course, and once a month he comes in for a tune-up treatment. He reminds me he can still shoot his age.
Effective Treatment for Degenerative Disc Disease
Computerized lumbar decompression therapy • Joint realignment, which allows decreased pressure on the disc • Muscle balance treatments • Core exercises to strengthen the muscles that support that joint • Natural anti-inflammatory such as Boswellia, turmeric, and hot packs for temporary relief • Electrical stimulation • Lumbar braces with the goal of reducing pressure on disc • Self care in the form of stretching, lower back exercises, and ergonomic modifications
Just like Tim, we can help you to become pain free! Call today to schedule your appointment and lets get you back to being pain free again!
Tell the receptionist that you would like to come in for the New Patient Special!
Jake Morgan DC
325-695-9355
Don’t forget to download your very own copy my latest book 21st Century Back Pain Solution!