Common Spine Treatment Options for Back Pain

Very few issues can be more debilitating than back pain. Severe back pain can derail your life, making it difficult to perform routine daily activities and enjoy athletic endeavors. Once back pain lasts at least three months, it is considered to be chronic. Chronic back pain can be particularly frustrating due to the extended duration of your pain. This is especially true when it’s hard to identify the underlying cause of your condition.

Fortunately, there are a variety of treatment options that can help you experience relief from chronic back pain and in many instances, you may be able to restore a pain free life without undergoing surgery. The specific treatments that will be best for your unique condition can only be determined after undergoing a thorough evaluation by a spine specialist, but the following overview will help you understand many of the most common treatment options available.

Physical Therapy

Physical therapy is often a critical component of back pain treatment. This treatment regimen involves a combination of in-person visits with your physical therapist and at-home exercises to perform between appointments. The purpose of physical therapy is to rebuild your spine’s strength and stability, which should help alleviate your pain. To achieve effective results with physical therapy, it’s important to attend your regularly scheduled appointments and complete your at-home exercises every day.

Your physical therapist will customize your program based on your specific injury and treatment goals, but it may include one or more of the following:

• Stretching and flexibility exercises
• Core strengthening
• Posture correction
• Aerobic conditioning
• Activities that test the limits of your pain tolerance

Spinal Injections

In many instances, spinal injections can be an effective treatment option to alleviate back pain. Injections are typically recommended when the cause of your back pain has been identified. It’s important to understand that spinal injections are considered to be a short-term treatment performed in conjunction with other approaches such as physical therapy, not a long-term solution. The short-term pain relief achieved with spinal injections can often help you maximize your ability to perform your physical therapy exercises, allowing you to achieve greater long-term relief from your program. In addition, the pain relief from injections can help you get back to participating in daily activities, and this can create a significant improvement in your overall mental wellbeing.

Some common spinal injections performed to alleviate back pain include:

• Cortisone Injections – These injections are performed to reduce inflammation around nerve roots and provide temporary pain relief
• Epidural Steroid Injections – These injections target specific areas of nerve compression to alleviate pain and facilitate participation in activities such as physical therapy
• Nerve Blocks – These injections can help block pain from specific nerves which may be the source of your discomfort

Medications

There are a variety of medications that can be used to manage your back pain. Depending on your specific condition, these may include:

• Over-the-Counter Pain Relievers – NSAIDs such as ibuprofen can help reduce inflammation and relieve mild pain
• Muscle Relaxants – These can be effective to treat acute pain caused by muscle spasms, but they’re generally not recommended for chronic back pain
• Neuromodulators – Medications targeting nerve pain, such as gabapentin, may be used to treat conditions such as sciatica.

Ablation

Ablation procedures insert a probe into your spine to generate enough heat to destroy a nerve and eliminate the pain signals that were coming from it.

Spine Surgery

If you’re unable to experience relief from the nonsurgical treatments discussed above, surgery may be recommended to treat your condition. There are a variety of spine surgery procedures, including many that are minimally invasive, and the right procedure for you will depend on the specifics of your condition.

Some potential reasons why you may need to consider spine surgery include:

• Chronic pain that hasn’t subsided after nonsurgical treatments have been exhausted
• Weakness in limbs
• Increasing muscle weakness
• New or worsening bowel and bladder issues such as groin numbness or incontinence
• Gait and balance problems

Colorado Advanced Orthopedics Can Help You Restore a Pain Free Life

If you’ve been struggling with chronic back pain, there are a variety of potential treatments available to help you find the relief you need. At Colorado Advanced Orthopedics, we’re committed to delivering the exceptional quality care you deserve, and our spine specialists can help you restore a pain free life.

Our team includes some of the finest board-certified, fellowship trained orthopedic surgeons and sports medicine doctors along the Western Slope, allowing our clinic to provide the high levels of patient care that typically are only available in major metropolitan areas. Our spine specialists offer both minimally invasive, nonsurgical spine treatments as well as surgical solutions, allowing us to customize your treatment plan to include the best options for your specific needs.

You’ll also benefit from our in-house physical therapy team which works closely with our spine specialists, ensuring that every phase of your treatment plan is aligned. This level of collaboration helps us achieve exceptional patient outcomes that will get you back to enjoying your favorite activities as soon as possible.

Contact us today to schedule an appointment. Colorado Advanced Orthopedics serves patients in Meeker, the White River Valley, Grand Junction and throughout the Western Slope.