In Part I of the common low back pain we’ve mentioned about the less severe symptoms that can be relieved by home therapy or exercising. In Part II of the common low back pain topic we will discuss conditions that area associated with more painful symptoms.
Specific localized low back pain that can be pointed out with one finger
Broad and wide spread low back pain that cannot identify origin of pain
Pain free when body at rest
Feeling restricted and painful during low back movement
Lying down or walking give reliefs
Pain relief after stretching or exercising
Back pain that spread from center low back to side of body
Severe immobilizing low back pain without any radiating symptoms down legs
Back pain that extends to sciatic nerve (glut) or hamstring muscles (back of thigh)
Knee, shin, or ankle pain
Cramping in legs
Numbness in any part of the legs or foot
Standing increase low back pain
Sitting or squatting down relief low back pain
Losing muscle functions in legs
Losing leg’s muscle mass
These are common symptoms for Lumbar Disc Annular Tear but not every patient who has annular tear has symptoms. Some patient can have zero symptoms with annular tear until something irritates it. This is of course different case by case. It all depends on where the annular tear occurs. There are also different types of annular tear, we won’t be going into details here but I may do another article regarding annular tear separately. At this point we just need to know that when we talk about annular tear we are talking about the breaking of ligamentous material (annular fiber) that surrounds the core of a disc (nucleus) and connects to the spine. There are couples things can cause the annular fiber to tear besides normal aging process.
Traumatic event
Repetitive motions such as lifting or twisting
Improper lifting or movement
Overweight
Sitting for extended amount of time
These are some the most common symptoms associated with low back disc bulge (disc herniation). The 4th and 5th lumbar vertebras (L4 & L5) are at the base of our spine and they are the easiest to accumulate pressure/stress when we sit and move. Therefore, they are usually the first to go. The sciatic nerve is the thickest nerve in our body because it is formed by 4th and 5th lumbar spine nerve and the nerves from sacrum. If any of the individual nerve has problem, sciatic nerve pain can also occur since they are associated. If back pain is associated with any symptoms below the knee it is likely that there might be a disc related problem.
If a person cannot stand for 30 min – 1 hour without having back pain and back pain improves when the person begins walking. This is considered an early sign of spinal stenosis. Patient with moderate severity usually can only walk a shorter amount of distance and will feel the need to lean forward or squat down to rest. At this point conservative treatments such as Chiropractic adjustment and Cox disc decompression might still be able to help however if trial treatment shows no improvements it is best to do surgical consultation.
These are symptoms for advanced spinal diseases. Typically when a nerve is compressed for long enough time, the symptoms will turn from feeling pain, numbness, tingling, pin needle etc to losing ability to control movements (losing muscle functions which are controlled by the compressed nerve). And then compress the nerve a bit more time, muscle will start to shrink in size.
Comments