Back Pain


What is back pain?

Back pain is discomfort that you feel in any part of your spine or the surrounding tissues. It can vary from a dull, low-intensity throbbing in your back to a series of sharp or stabbing sensations through your spine that make it hard to move.

There are three types of back pain:

• Acute back pain lasts from several days to several weeks
• Subacute back pain lasts between one and three months
• Chronic back pain persists for more than three months

As many as four out of every five people in the United States are likely to experience some sort of serious back pain at least once during their lives. However, many don't take their back pain seriously until it becomes too severe to live with.

By consulting a back pain expert like Dr. Manocha from the start, you can avoid losing so much time and energy to this potentially disabling disorder.

What conditions might give me back pain?

Some of the most common conditions responsible for back pain include:

• Herniated or bulging discs
• Degenerative joint disease (osteoarthritis)
• Degenerative disc disease
• Sciatica
• Spinal stenosis
• Sprains
• Scoliosis and other skeletal irregularities
• Radiculopathy (nerve compression)
• Spondylolisthesis

Most cases of back pain result from mechanical issues in your body, where parts of your spine are damaged or pushed out of place.

Sciatica, for example, is a common cause of shooting pain down one leg due to compression of the sciatic nerve in your lower back (lumbar radiculopathy). The nerve compression that causes sciatica is likely to stem from a bulging or herniated disc, where the core of the disc pushes against or through its outer layer.

What treatments are available for back pain?

For many patients, Dr. Manocha finds that non-invasive physical therapies are excellent for reducing pain and improving function. Regular physical therapy sessions combined with home exercises can make a significant difference for the majority of patients, regardless of the cause of their back pain.

Medication may also help manage back pain and enable you to complete your physical therapy. However, it doesn't address the cause of your condition and cannot cure your back pain.

If your pain is muscular or comes from the fascia – the stretchy connective tissue that covers and links your muscles – Dr. Manocha can treat it using trigger point injections. These injections contain local anesthetic or steroid medication that eases inflammation and pain in tight, knotted tissues.

Other injections of steroids and anesthetics might also be necessary for persistent spinal pain. Options include epidural steroid injections, nerve blocks, transforaminal injections, and facet joint injections.

For help with your back pain, call Interventional Pain Center or book an appointment online today.