Run an online news search for stories about back pain and you will discover something interesting: there are lots of people claiming that many different things helped eliminate their pain. You might be tempted to believe that most of the stories are nonsense. But consider the possibility that they might all be absolutely truthful.
A dozen different articles proposing a dozen different methods for addressing back pain might actually be legitimate. How can that be? It all boils down to the root causes of back pain. When you understand just how many things can create pain in the back, you begin to understand why there are so many different treatments for it.
Back Pain Is Easy to Come By
The cybersphere is littered with articles talking about back pain because the pain itself is so common. In fact, back pain is one of the most frequently heard complaints in doctors’ offices. The pain doctors at Weatherford, Texas-based Lone Star Pain Medicine certainly see their fair share of back pain patients.
They say that back pain is easy to come by; lots of things can cause it. For example, lower back pain is often caused by strained muscles and ligaments. Those muscles and ligaments are strained by physical activity. How do you treat such back pain? You start by identifying the physical activity that is causing it.
If Lone Star is treating a patient whose job includes copious amounts of manual labor, there may be questions of whether that patient does a lot of heavy lifting. And if so, educating the patient in the proper way to lift safely might solve the problem once and for all.
Yoga, Weightlifting, and Exercise
Believe it or not, back pain can be the result of being out of shape. Remember that your spine has to support the entire weight of your upper body. Being out of shape only makes its job more difficult. A lack of physical fitness accompanied by excess weight means even more stress being put on the spine.
What is the solution? Getting in shape. Doctors might recommend yoga to stretch out the muscles and help strengthen them. They might recommend weightlifting to strengthen back and leg muscles. They might suggest general exercise to shed the extra pounds and take more stress off the spine.
Spinal Injections for Chronic Pain
While most cases of temporary back pain are minor, there are times when chronic pain is the result of something more serious. A good example would be a condition known as facet joint syndrome. Facet joints are the joints in the spine and are that which give the spine its flexibility. Facet joint syndrome occurs when these joints begin to break down, thereby causing pain when bones make contact.
A spinal injection is a remarkably effective treatment for facet joint pain. An injection can do a number of things. First, it can bathe the targeted area with pain medicine that offers immediate relief. Second, it can reduce inflammation for more long-term relief.
One-Size-Fits-All Doesn’t Apply
The thing about back pain is that there isn’t a single cause. Likewise, there is no one-size-fits-all treatment that offers every patient significant pain relief. Doctors have to look at every case of back pain based on its own merits. What works for one patient may not work for another.
In the end, everything you read about seems to work for back pain only because there are so many conditions that cause pain. In reality, what you are seeing are a handful of treatments that work on different types of back pain.
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