Facts About Back Pain That Might Surprise You

Chiropractors treat many different conditions, but back pain is one of the most common reasons that someone seeks chiropractic care.

Unfortunately, many people suffer with back pain for months or years before seeing a chiropractor… often seeing several different doctors first before coming in and getting better.

I couldn’t even begin to guess how many times that I’ve seen this in my office.

Often patients have been to 3, 4, 5 or more doctors including surgeons before trying chiropractic care and finally getting better even though they were told by their doctors that there was nothing that could be done except surgery to help them.

Back Pain Is Common (But It’s NOT Normal)!

As many as 31 million Americans experience lower back pain on any given day. Back pain is exceptionally common and it’s effect on an individual can be devastating.

Back pain is the second most common reason for visits to the doctor’s office, only behind the common cold.

Unfortunately, our mainstream model of treating back pain is certainly not working.

Americans spend at more than an estimated $50 billion each year on back pain… on everything from over the counter pain relievers, braces, topical ointments, doctor’s visits, prescription medications, therapy, and surgery.

Lower back pain is the leading cause of disability. Causing many people to lose their ability to work either temporarily or permanently.

Half of the people working in our country experience back pain symptoms each year.

What Causes Back Pain?

The vast majority of people suffering with back pain have mechanical back pain.

They don’t have a fracture, cancer, or an infection. They have mechanical problems in their back that results in pain, stiffness, and problems moving.

The source can be from a recent injury from something like a fall, a car accident, or a sports injury.

Back pain can also be related to overuse, repetitive stress over time, and a variety of other reasons.

Your  back is made up of many different structures… a complicated bones, discs, joints, ligaments, muscles, and nerves – all of these things and more can cause problems for you.

When I see a patient for lower back pain, I evaluate all these things and more using a series of examination tests to localize the source of back pain. 

It’s important to do this even if you’ve already had x-rays and an MRI because these tests are a picture. They’re often important tests, but they only show how things look. Unfortunately, the images do not show how things are working and can’t identify the source of your pain without the benefit of a good history and examination. We can not see pain on an x-ray or MRI.

I have often seen patients that have back pain and a disc herniation, but the herniation isn’t what is causing most of the pain. In these cases, the majority of the pain is coming from another area nearby the herniation.

The disc herniation can certainly be the primary pain generator, but sometimes it’s not the source of most of your pain. The pain can be coming from other structures in the area that aren’t functioning properly and are generating pain, even pain that goes down your leg.

I know this is contrary to what you may have heard in the past but no doctor of any type can tell you based solely on the MRI why you have back pain.

We must look carefully at other things because you may very likely have more than one problem and the majority of problems that cause back pain do not even show up on MRIs.

If you think about it, it makes sense. If you herniate a disc in your lower back with trauma, then the forces are also great enough to damage other nearby structures.

The problem is that the vast majority of this damage will not be visualized on the MRI. We simply can’t see the small ligaments, the joint cartilage, and many of the small muscles in the area on the picture.

Some of these injuries can be very painful and mimic the pain of a disc herniation. This is why it’s important to see a doctor that is aware of these things and one that has the experience to identify them.

I wrote a report that goes into more detail about back pain, including a few causes that most doctors don’t even think about PLUS how to best get rid of it once and for all.

Dr. Marc Hagebusch

Doctor Of Chiropractic

Hagebusch Chiropractic  Call Us  Email Us

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