If you’ve ever been to see a back pain specialist, in particular one offering manual manipulation, you might have understood the treatment as ‘putting the bones back into place’. In reality, the ‘pops’ and ‘clicks’ of manual manipulation are actually a release of gas from an air pocket, which achieves relief because it releases a stiff joint. However, this release is not putting the bone back into place, and could make you dependent on the treatment – rather like cracking your knuckles, the more you do it, the more you feel like you need to do it. So how exactly can you put your ‘bones back into place’ and achieve long term relief from back pain?
Here at the clinic, we incorporate spinal remodelling as an effective tool to help our patients to achieve back pain relief for the long term. During this article we’ll be explaining how this process happens, why it’s important to get in-depth analysis if you have back pain, and what the impact is on that patient. In the two examples we’re going to discuss today, the patients originally presented with severe back pain that had become chronic – the injury was not fresh from a couple of days ago.
Before & After: Lower Back Pain
When a patient first comes to the clinic suffering with their back or neck pain, we complete a thorough examination and use standing X-rays to take a closer look at the alignment of the spine while that patient is weight-bearing. In our first before photo, this is a lower back curve which is measured using our software to be -19 degrees – this is a 50% loss of curve – and effectively shifts all the pressure onto the discs at the bottom of the lumbar spine (L4-L5 and L5-S1). The body will always be trying to heal itself, but if the pressure is constantly on the disc then it will not be able to heal effectively – this is where injuries will persist and in the long-term become chronic. Relieving the patient’s pain will be our first port of call, using our treatments which you can read more about here, but soon after they will be able to progress onto using a tool at home called a denneroll (or spinal orthotic). Used for 20 minutes a day, in a position that is tailored specifically to their individual curve, the denneroll helps to restore curve back into the spine. Someone with this type of curve in their spine, may feel relief from more traditional treatment methods, but the likelihood of them being able to achieve long-term relief is very slim due to the fact that their spine is misaligned and is going to continue to place pressure on this disc. Over time, this could cause issues such as disc bulging or herniation, or other complications of these conditions.
Fast forward to a few months time in May and the difference is very clear. You can actually see that the curve is improving, there is a return of the lordosis (the natural curve that should be present in your lower back). The red line represents the patient’s curve, while the green line represents the ideal curve, you can see those are matching up much closer compared to the before. This is how the bones have been able to be ‘put back in place’ correctly.
Why Can Back Pain Recur?
When a patient first comes to the clinic suffering with their back or neck pain, we complete a thorough examination and use standing X-rays to take a closer look at the alignment of the spine while that patient is weight-bearing. In our first before photo, this is a lower back curve which is measured using our software to be -19 degrees – this is a 50% loss of curve – and effectively shifts all the pressure onto the discs at the bottom of the lumbar spine (L4-L5 and L5-S1). The body will always be trying to heal itself, but if the pressure is constantly on the disc then it will not be able to heal effectively – this is where injuries will persist and in the long-term become chronic. Relieving the patient’s pain will be our first port of call, using our treatments which you can read more about here, but soon after they will be able to progress onto using a tool at home called a denneroll (or spinal orthotic). Used for 20 minutes a day, in a position that is tailored specifically to their individual curve, the denneroll helps to restore curve back into the spine. Someone with this type of curve in their spine, may feel relief from more traditional treatment methods, but the likelihood of them being able to achieve long-term relief is very slim due to the fact that their spine is misaligned and is going to continue to place pressure on this disc. Over time, this could cause issues such as disc bulging or herniation, or other complications of these conditions.
Fast forward to a few months time in May and the difference is very clear. You can actually see that the curve is improving, there is a return of the lordosis (the natural curve that should be present in your lower back). The red line represents the patient’s curve, while the green line represents the ideal curve, you can see those are matching up much closer compared to the before. This is how the bones have been able to be ‘put back in place’ correctly.
Before & After: Neck Pain
With neck curve, we often see more substantial misalignment, with less severe injury – that is to say the patient might experience quite a bit of pain before they realise that a problem is occurring. So it is quite common for us to see a greater reduction in curve. In our example here, the patient has a -8 degree curve, it is almost completely straight – compared to the -42 degrees that is should be. Similarly to the lower back, misalignment will drive the pressure through the discs in the lower part of your neck, which are not ordinarily going to be able to withstand that pressure. More pressure on a day-in day-out basis is going to also elongate muscles on the back, which can cause you further muscle pain and tension in the upper back or shoulders.
In the after imaging, the curve in the neck has changed by almost 200%, and again it’s looking much healthier in comparison to the straight alignment we saw before. It’s starting to bend in the right place, and with continued use of the denneroll, this will improve further. There comes a point where the denneroll is no longer needed to be used everyday, but will only be used a couple of times a week as a maintenance.
Why Is In-Depth Analysis Important?
Without this level of in-depth analysis on the neck or lower back, certain exercises you may be recommended to do, may not be actually be beneficial for your type of condition. Try to make sure that if you’re in a lot of pain, and the problem has been ongoing for a number of weeks or months, that you visit a practitioner who uses a similar level of analysis to form the basis of treatment. The treatment we do here is specifically tailored to your alignment, as is the rehabilitation, and the patient must also be diligent in following instructions. While treatment here can last roughly an hour, a couple of times a week at first, the other hours during the week you need to be able to make sure you’re not doing anything that’s going to be causing you any further harm. In these cases we will usually be able to make a recommendation if we think something in your job might aggravate your condition.
We hope this article has been helpful in being able to help you see the change that is possible with both the treatment that we do here in the clinic, and also the rehabilitation and remodelling that takes place at home. If you do have any questions, please do get in touch to see how we can help, or to book in for your first appointment with us. To reach out, either email us at info@themayfairclinic.com, or call us at 02039473222.
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