Milwaukee Board Certified Chiropractic Orthopedist and Herniated Disc Doctor writes: Sometimes back pain seems like it goes on forever. It can be pretty scary wondering about your future. "What if I continue to get worse? What if my sciatic leg pain never goes away? Will I ever be able to get back to a normal life again?"
Some things never can get better. A piece of steak never turns back into a cow's leg. Humpty-Dumpty couldn't be put back together again. Done is done.
But the good thing about living things is they have the capacity to heal. Healing means repair and replacement of diseased, broken or failing tissue. Living things heal, dead things don't. So even the disc can heal. Slowly. And under the right conditions. But the tissue does have living cells that are able to repair and replace damaged tissue.
The 23 discs in your spine are shock absorbers and fulcrums for movement of the bones of the spine. They are made of a liquid center with twenty layers of fibers wrapped around it. They function best when they are thick and flexible with a lot of fluid inside. But when the fibers break down because of too much force on them then the fluid can leak out and the disc starts to lose height. Thin discs don't absorb shock and don't allow the bones to move very well. Over time the loss of function leads to pain and more stiffness and eventually problems with the nerves that come out from the spine between the bones.
The disc height cannot increase without removing the forces that compress the disc. As the disc height increases it becomes easier for nourishing fluid to be squeezed into and out of the disc. This is what gives the disc cells the material to build new fibers to strengthen the disc.
In our office we use the DRX-9000 Non-Surgical Disc Decompression unit to do this. A recent study used the DRX-9000 on thirty people with herniated discs. The researchers measured the height of the discs before and after a series of treatments on the DRX-9000. Pain levels were reduced 74% and disc heights increased 15% over the course of the treatment. The results showed that as the pain is reduced there is an increase of height of the disc with spinal decompression, leading the researchers to suggest that pain reduction may be the result of the restoration of disc height.
While this entire process has not been studied fully, the scientific outcomes are beginning to accumulate and re-inforce our clinical successes with solving herniated disc problems.
Patience is the key. Healing takes place at the rate Nature allows. Frustration with this leads people to gamble with their health and seek out the quick fix that promises to make you all better right away. It is tempting to give in and go for the quick fix. But looking at the bigger picture shows that the quick fix sometimes has disappointment in the long run when a large percentage of people are not satisfied with the outcome and many are even worsened by the treatment itself.
Keeping a healthy spine should start as early in life as you learn about the benefits of doing so. We can help you with that. Whether you are nine or ninety it is never too late to help start restoring more normal function to your spine so it can stay as healthy as possible. We have been keeping Milwaukeeans healthy and active for 26 years using our safe effective and comfortable treatment for lower back disc herniations, degeneration, stenosis and sciatica.
If you or someone you know has a bad back or the symptoms of herniated disc, spinal stenosis, sciatica or degenerative disc disease call us at (414) 355-0433 to schedule a Complimentary Consultation with Dr. Donaldson to find out if you qualify for one of our StandUpRight Spinal Disc Decompression programs or request a free appointment online.
