4.  I've had low back pain with sciatica for six years, and medical tests indicate I have a bulging disc. I've been told by an orthopedic surgeon that surgery is the only thing that could help me. Do you think flexion therapy might help me?

A. Chiropractors see patients with low back pain, sciatic pain, and disc injuries every day. With a comprehensive treatment plan including spinal adjustments, flexion therapy, exercises, and physiotherapy most patients respond successfully without surgery.   If you have been diagnosed with a spinal disc injury and you've been told that surgery is the only option, we suggest you give our alternative treatment an opportunity to help you first. We just might be able to help you avoid surgery!

 

5.  For years I had excruciating low back pain from a disc injury. I finally agreed to have surgery, and for six months after that, I was pain-free. Now, I'm starting to have quite a bit of low back pain again. Do you think you could help me, even though I've already had surgery?

A. Most people with a spinal disc injury experience acute muscle spasms, intense inflammation and swelling, acute pain, and severe structural imbalance and misalignment. Corrective spinal disc surgery can sometimes help alleviate or decrease the acute muscle spasms, intense inflammation and swelling, and the acute pain, but it does nothing to correct the severe structural imbalance and misalignment that is always present. Frequently, this structural imbalance and misalignment was a major contributing factor to the injury in the first place. If not corrected, this severe structural stress remains. It is this structural stress that I feel is the primary reason that most people who undergo spinal disc surgery seem to experience back pain again within five years.

Chiropractic care with flexion therapy is the recommended treatment of choice for spinal disc injuries, even if surgery has already been performed. If you have undergone spinal disc surgery, it is definitely recommended to receive treatment to correct the structural stress that most likely contributed to the problem in the first place, and can easily continue to cause problems. We use "light touch, low force" chiropractic techniques along with gentle flexion therapy to help bring your body back into structural balance, which often alleviates the returning or continuing pain after spinal disc surgery.

 

6.  I've never had a massage before, although it's been recommended for my stiff neck. Do you think massage is beneficial, and do you think it could help me?

A. Muscle spasms that often accompany structural imbalance would rapidly cause the spine and pelvis to misalign, again and again. Massage therapy in conjunction with chiropractic care can greatly accelerate the response time in healing.

Massage therapy can be extremely helpful in many of the musculoskeletal conditions that people frequently experience. The stiffness of the neck that you are experiencing is often caused in part by muscle spasms either in the neck or shoulders, and usually can be greatly benefited with a combination of massage therapy and chiropractic care.

 

7.  A physical therapist recently told me that I had muscular adhesions in my shoulders. Can you tell me what she meant?

A. When a muscle is in spasm, it's constantly working, or contracting, which means it's also constantly producing metabolic waste products such as lactic acid. Because blood flow tends to be greatly decreased in tight or spastic muscles, the waste products quickly accumulate within the muscle tissue instead of being carried away by the blood circulation to be eliminated. This combination of excess lactic acid and decreased blood flow within the muscles tends to cause tissue irritation and eventual inflammation. In time, the thin layer of fluid between individual muscle fibers and bundles of muscle fibers can dry out due to this chronic irritation and inflammation. If this happens, the muscle fibers and bundles of muscle fibers start adhering, or sticking together, instead of gliding over each other. This knot of muscle fibers stuck together is known as an adhesion. In time, if these adhesions aren't dissloved, the muscle can turn into dense, shortened, fibrous tissue which is extremely difficult to restore to normal. Therapeutic massage is the best, and frequently the only, way that I have seen to help dissolve muscular adhesions and restore the muscle tissue back to its healthy state.

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