Back surgery isn’t always necessary to relieve back pain. Adogwa and colleagues reported that less than 1% of 497,822 lumbar spinal stenosis or
spondylolisthesis patients required back surgery. (1) What do the other 99% require?
Pain relief. Reassurance and knowledge of their condition.
Gentle treatment. A solid treatment plan. Arctic Chiropractic, Sitka has
such a plan for Sitka
post-back-surgery, failed back surgery syndrome, continued back pain (choose
your term!) patients that integrates safe, doctor-supervised,
patient-involved chiropractic care via The Cox® Technic System of
Spinal Pain Management.
BACK PAIN RELIEF AFTER BACK SURGERY
Certain researchers in the medical profession want to discard
their term “failed back surgical syndrome” for “persistent
spinal pain syndrome type 2.” For such patients with pain after back surgery with a laminectomy, discectomy, or fusion who sought
chiropractic spinal manipulation for relief, numeric pain rating scale (0-10/worst-pain
scale) scores dropped from 6.6 to 0.6 and Oswestry Disability
Index (0 to 100/worst-pain scale) scores dropped from 43.8
to 2.4. At one year post chiropractic care (multi-modal
chiropractic care with flexion-distraction among the treatments),
48% sustained their improvement, 42% had
a recurrence, 10% were inaccessible for follow
up. (2) A retrospective review of 32 cases of post-lumbar spine surgery pain
patients documented numeric pain score changes from 6.4 to
2.3 (on a 10 point scale) for a 4.1 drop in pain. No adverse
events were documented for any of the postsurgical
patients in this review with the mean
number of treatments being 14. Chiropractic care included the delivery of Cox® flexion distraction. (3) A prospective study of 69
post-surgical continued pain patients who reported back pain after
back surgery were treated by 15 chiropractors. All delivered care via
protocols of the Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management. 50% or greater
relief of pain at the end of active care was documented
for 81% of the patients. The mean number of days of care was 49 days and treatments
was 11. A 24-months’ follow up found that 56
patients were available. 78.6% of them had continued pain
relief of more than 50%. Mean pain relief at end of care was 71.6
and 70 at 2-years follow-up. 43% had not sought further
care in 2 years. 32 patients had: 17 of them went through
chiropractic manipulation, 8 had PT, exercise, injections, and medication; 5 went
through further surgery. (Bottomline: Greater than 50% relief of back
pain following back surgery was realized for 81% of
patients in 11 visits over 49 days.) (4) Sitka back pain sufferers
who have already had back surgery may welcome
these outcomes for themselves! Arctic Chiropractic, Sitka is prepared to help.
UNDERSTANDING OF BIOMECHANICAL CHANGES
To commit to a plan, all involved must know what is going to happen to affect a change in pain. One study measured the short-term
effect of flexion distraction spinal manipulation on various spinal aspects
of sufferers who have lumbar degenerative disc
disease (DDD). Intervertebral disc height was increased from
6.32 to 6.93. Back pain reduced from 69.17 to 48.48. Lumbar
spine mobility improved as it changed from 17.37 to 12.69 (bent
over with fingers reaching for the floor). Passive straight
leg raise increased from 46.94 to 56.01. (5) These are desired
and documented changes with gentle, safe Sitka chiropractic care.
CONTACT Arctic Chiropractic, Sitka
Listen to this PODCAST
with Dr. David Atiyeh on The
Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he
describes the relief with The Cox® Technic System of Spinal
Pain Management for a patient who’d gone through
back surgery and still had back pain.
Make your Sitka chiropractic
appointment now. Back surgery is not the only option
for many with back pain. And for those who have previously undergone
back surgery, the non-surgical approach with chiropractic may ultimately
produce the pain relief you want.