Radiculopathy (Nerve Impingement) and Back Pain
When you’re experiencing back pain, it can feel like there’s no end in sight. However, knowing a little bit about how your back and spine works can actually go a long way in helping you to help your doctor or therapist in diagnosing your issues and thus helping you to overcome your pain and mobility issues. For example, were you aware that your entire back and spinal column acts as a huge telecommunications center from your brain to the rest of your body? While this is helpful to prevent you from getting injured or keep you out of trouble, it also means that when you are experiencing back pain, it can radiate from one part of your body and affect others. This is often referred to as Radiculopathy (Nerve Impingement).
Along the entire length of your spinal column, each one of your vertebrae has a series of nerve endings that come out of it to send signals to your body. Nerves nearer the top of your spine, known as the cervical spine, travel down through your arms to your fingers, whereas nerves in your lower back can cause your legs and feet to have pain. Essentially, when you feel pain radiating from your spine towards your extremities, you may be experiencing radiculopathic symptoms.
As with most back pain, ignoring it or trying to treat it at home is not a great idea. The longer your back pain goes undiagnosed, the longer your body has to degenerate and create bigger problems. The best course of action is to visit a specialist, who can use multiple techniques to help diagnose your symptoms and the cause of your back pain. Specialists such as Integrated Spine & Sports use many different methods to not only diagnose, but to treat your back pain, developing a plan that’s as individual as you are.
Source: https://www.spine-health.com/conditions/spine-anatomy/radiculopathy-radiculitis-and-radicular-pain
Our approach to treating back pain
By visiting a back pain specialist clinic such as Integrated Spine & Sports, the professionals there can help individually tailor a program to help both manage your symptoms and work on your recovery.
We offer non-surgical options for the treatment of injuries and medical conditions affecting the back, with an integrative approach that may include:
Back Pain Specialists
Our back pain specialists in Manhattan create custom treatments designed to meet the needs of people suffering from acute pain due to injury, as well as those experiencing chronic conditions affecting the muscles, discs, soft tissue and nerves within the back, cervical spine, and neck.
Our integrative team, consisting of a board-certified physiatrist, chiropractors, and physical therapists, offers comprehensive treatment for acute and chronic back pain treatment in NYC.
Back Pain FAQs
Some of the common symptoms of COVID-19 are “aches and pains”. Some patients do experience back pain, especially in the lower back. In some cases, the pain is subtle but constant. In others, it is an intense, pulsating pain, which can radiate down to the legs. If the back pain persists, consult your doctor.
Generally, the best position to sleep is on your back. Sleeping on one’s back ensures that the spine is in a neutral position, which can help with back pain. You can also put a pillow under your knees, legs, and/or lower back to support the natural curve of the spine. This can minimize lumbar pressure and relieve back pain.
If doing gentle back stretches doesn’t do the trick, then try strengthening your core so your spine isn’t struggling to stay upright. Heat therapy and cold therapy can also work well for pain relief. If your back pain is a result of poor posture or a bad workstation setup, make the necessary changes to avoid back pain in the future.
Your back pain is likely serious if it occurs with any of the following symptoms: numbness in lower body, loss of bladder/bowel control, fever, unexplained weight loss, swelling. In such cases, please consult a physiatrist immediately.
Short-term (or acute) back pain lasts a few days to a few weeks. This is often the case with back pain, and patients usually recover without medical treatment. Sometimes, it lasts for 12 weeks or longer. This is called chronic back pain, and it can take a while to go away. Medical treatment often helps relieve chronic backpain, so we recommend consulting a physiatrist.
Acupuncture provides short-term relief for chronic back pain. Back pain is actually the number 1 reported reason people seek acupuncture. By stimulating the various acupuncture points associated with back pain, parts of the nervous system are also stimulated, which can help provide pain relief.