Ideas for treatment

[Yeloroses]

Hi Everyone - I'm a 56 year old woman with back issues. I have a middle left narrowing of L1, L2, L3 and L4. I have bulging at the discs and shortening of vertebrae. I also have a 38 deg. curve in lower back. I have degenerative disc disease in L4 and L5. L3 is pinching a nerve that goes down the front of my right leg. I have a massage every 2 weeks and I also heard decompression can help and have been in chiropractic treatment for 3 months. They were doing light treatment, decompression and ice treatment on my back however I was not seeing much relief. I had a steroid shot in 2006 and felt great (pain free) for 3 weeks. What would you suggest would be a good option for me to try next? I'm sick and tired of using pain meds as a source of relief. Thank you.

[livingtwisted]

Inversion table?

Sorry to hear you haven't been able to find any relief for your pain. The thing that is helping me the most right now is using an inversion table for just 5 minutes twice a day. I was doing decompression traction at a chiropractor previously and I find the inversion table to be much better at relieving pain. But I know others have not found it helpful so if you're interested I would recommend finding a way to try one out before you buy.

[leahdragonfly]

Hi there,

A few quick ideas:

another steroid shot since the first one was so helpful. I think you can have several of these per year.

physical therapy. A good, knowledgeable PT will be able to do so much more for you than a chiropractor (especially since the chiropractic isn't helping).

swimming or water exercise!

surgery should be your very last resort after you give these other things at least 6 months of diligent effort. Do you know if your curve is stable at 38 degrees?

Good luck,

[Yeloroses]

Update

Hi Guys: TY Mehera and Leahdragonfly for your kind responses. I just got back from Spine Dr. I'm going in for a new MRI (open one) and then I'm having injections. My L4 is compressed and is pinching the nerve which goes down the front of my leg which is causing the pain. My right hip is higher than the left because of the 38 degrees scoliosis curve. which also makes the middle of my back muscle (on the left) inflamed because it's compensating. Good grief!! I'm sooooooo sick of this pain and if the injections work, so be it.

[loves to skate]

Hi Guys: TY Mehera and Leahdragonfly for your kind responses. I just got back from Spine Dr. I'm going in for a new MRI (open one) and then I'm having injections. My L4 is compressed and is pinching the nerve which goes down the front of my leg which is causing the pain. My right hip is higher than the left because of the 38 degrees scoliosis curve. which also makes the middle of my back muscle (on the left) inflamed because it's compensating. Good grief!! I'm sooooooo sick of this pain and if the injections work, so be it.

I tried all of the above suggestions and ended up having surgery anyway. A lot of money and time wasted before I found the help I needed. I hope the less invasive approach works for you. Make sure your spine Doctor is an SRS Doctor.
Sally

[jrnyc]

hi Yeloroses
welcome to the forum!

i don't know what helps discs...besides the initial oral steroid tx often given...and that has to be weaned down quickly...so though it helped me, i hurt badly once i was off the pills after 10 days!

by now i have degenerative disc disease, besides scoli (curves of T42, L61), spinal stenosis, arthritis, listhesis, hypokyphosis, etc etc...also have sciatica down the left leg, which didn't used to bother me...in the last year, it has gotten very painful...

botox shots work for my thoracic area for muscle spasms....nothing has really helped lumbar pain...have had epidurals, facet blocks, nerve ablation, SI joint injections, etc....most relief i got was 3 glorious pain free weeks from SI joint injections! some of the injections did nothing at all!

since you don't have a large scoli curve, i could see how fusion might not be recommended now...the discs, however, can cause a huge amount of pain! if/when i finally have fusion T11-pelvis, it might be because of the disc pain!

my personal recommendation, as a patient (i have zero medical training) is find a top SRS scoli surgeon for consults, and a good pain management doctor, or physiatrist, for pain management...in my opinion, chiros are not very useful...but that is my own bias....

i hope the injections help you...
best of luck
jess