February 07, 2017
What a good question! Spine surgeons aren’t positive about the best route for spinal stenosis, but conservative care is earning more and more attention in the medical research! Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C. delivers non-surgical care that is quite soothing to Auburn spinal stenosis sufferers. Our patients at Auburn who have spinal stenosis come to Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C. will find our care gentle and comfortable and applaud the research and procedures that make up its administration.
Before going further lets delve into what is spinal stenosis. Spinal stenosis is the result of narrowing in the spinal canal area. Lumbar spinal stenosis comes with age for a number of us when degeneration of the spine occurs. This may have to do with how the spinal elements were formed from square one at birth. (In some cases people are born with narrow spinal canals.) Likewise spinal stenosis can be the effect of a disc herniation that is inserting itself into the spinal canal, taking up the space that is supposed to be for the spinal nerves. Whatever the cause, spinal stenosis’ narrowing causes pain.
Surgeons see spinal stenosis and provide surgical options to open that narrowed space. There are many procedures from which a patient may pick. Decompressive surgery is one such option.. It is an affordable treatment for lumbar spinal stenosis, but surgical and conservative treatment approaches result in comparable quality of life at one year follow up. (1) Spinal fusion can also be instrumental against spinal stenosis. A Cochrane Database Review, a big deal in the world of research, reports that there is no significant difference at 6 months and 12 months post spine surgery for lumbar spinal stenosis. Cochrane pulled from 12,966 citations to conclude further that they have very little confidence to determine whether surgical or conservative care is better for lumbar spinal stenosis. They, therefore, offer no new clinical practice recommendations for doctors to follow. They do emphasize though that side-effects from surgery range from 10% to 24% and side effects from conservative care, 0%. There were no side effects from conservative care for lumbar spine stenosis in their review. Further, they report that there were no clear benefits seen with surgery versus no surgery. They warn clinicians to carefully inform patients about possible treatment options “especially given that conservative treatment options have results in no reported side effects.” (2)
When your chiropractor at Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C. sees spinal stenosis they will treat it with chiropractic care and spinal manipulation to conservatively relieve the pain of spinal stenosis. Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C. is the site for Auburn conservative care of back pain. Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C. uses the Cox Technic system of spinal manipulation to open the spinal canal area by 28%, allowing the nerves to breathe, and drop intradiscal pressures to as low as -192mmHg. (3,4)
For relief of pain due to lumbar spinal stenosis, call Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C., the Auburn chiropractic practice for gentle relief of back pain. Dr. Le's Chiropractic & Wellness, L.L.C. chiropractic care at Auburn may well be the answer to the question of “what to do with spinal stenosis?” for you!
