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154 Adamsville Road N., Bridgewater, NJ 08807
Steven C. Balestracci,
D.C., C.C.P.C.P.
Terresa D. Balestracci,
D.C., C.C.P.C.P.
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D
O YOU OR ANYONE YOU KNOW
SUFFER WITH LOW BACK AND LEG PAIN
OFTEN REFERRED TO AS SCIATICA?
By: Dr. Steven Balestracci, Total Health Chiropractic
In today’s article we will be discussing some of
the causes and solutions to addressing these
common problems that 95% of human beings
suffer with at least one time over a lifetime.
For Sciatica sufferers, a good night’s sleep
may be past and with this low back condition
simple things like walking, bending, turning,
sitting or standing up can become difficult or
impossible.
What is the Sciatic Nerve? Your sciatic nerve is
the longest and largest nerve in your body. It
begins in your low back and is the sum total of
five nerves that join together like a web to
form one large nerve that extends into the
backside of your pelvis, buttock, thigh, knee,
calf, ankle, foot and toes. When this, the
largest nerve of your body, becomes inflamed
and causes intense pain into the back of your
leg the condition is called Sciatica. This pain
may follow the path of your nerve down the
backside of your entire lower extremity into
your toes or can simply radiate across and into
your low back. Although Sciatic pain is usually
in the back side of the legs or thighs, in some
cases the pain can be on the side or front of
the legs and hips. Other symptoms associated
with this pain may be burning, pins and nee-
dles, tingling, prickling, crawling sensations,
tenderness and even numbness. This pain and
its accompanying symptoms may vary through-
out the day and can last for days, weeks or
even months if not addressed properly.
How does this nerve become inflamed? Like
many conditions Sciatica has many causes.
Injuries to the spine are the main reason and
can occur through auto accidents, sports
injuries, slips and falls, improper lifting or
bending, poor posture, house work, garden-
ing, and even childbirth. These causes inher-
ently create misalignments of the spinal verte-
bra through ligament damage and are called
Spinal Subluxation. Other causes of Sciatica
are slipped/bulging or ruptured/herniated or
degenerated discs, arthritis, constipation,
tumors and even vitamin deficiency.
How would someone go about taking care of
Sciatic pain? People who only want pain relief
may consider treating only the symptoms with
painkillers, muscle relaxers, anti-inflammatory
medications, injections and in extreme cases
surgery while others choose a more natural
treatment approach such as massage, yoga,
physical and physio therapy, nutrition,
acupuncture and of course chiropractic spinal
adjustments. In many cases it is a combination
of treatments that work best. As a chiroprac-
tic physician we utilize a host of therapies, as
mentioned above, in conjunction with spinal
adjustments in order to decrease nerve and
muscle inflammation, muscle spasm and joint
inflammation. Spinal adjustments are admin-
istered in order to remove nerve pressure, disc
pressure and joint dysfunction which creates a
lack of balance and continued irritation.
Many sciatica sufferers have experienced dra-
matic relief after chiropractic adjustments
have been administered by a chiropractic
physician who is highly trained to treat such a
condition as well as many other spinal and
joint conditions. Many sufferers of sciatica
and leg pain have found that chiropractic
adjustments were superior to general traction
and pain injections, and often saved them
from spinal surgery. In one controlled study
four different approaches were used to deal
with low back pain in sciatic problems. These
treatments were spinal care, general traction
and two types of injections. The group that
had spinal experienced the greatest degrees
of recovery. Interestingly enough a large num-
ber of the general traction category eventual-
ly required surgery. In another study, 20
patients age 20-65 with low back relatedly leg
pain were divided into three groups that were
given medical care, chiropractic care and
steroid injections. After 12 weeks the medical
and steroid injections showed no advantage
over the safer, non-drug related improve-
ments the chiropractic patients experienced.
Chiropractic treatments appear to have been
most effective on sciatica when used first.
Unfortunately many people think medical
care first. However, even in this group of peo-
ple, excellent results were obtained with sub-
sequent chiropractic treatment as mentioned
earlier. In another study 3,136 people with
lower back pain and sciatica pain who previ-
ously had physiotherapy and medications
with no positive results were given chiroprac-
tic care. A follow-up two years later showed
that 50.4% had excellent results with no
painful relapses, 34.4% had relapses but then
responded favorably after further chiropractic
care while 15.2% showed no significant
improvement.
Finally, if you do have sciatica, from whatever
cause, you should seek treatment from a chi-
ropractic physician in order to receive chiro-
practic spinal adjustments for the purpose of
removing spinal subluxations that cause
nerve, disc, and joint pressure as well as
inflammation and muscle spasms. Eventually
these issues can lead to sciatic and other types
of pain. Interestingly enough, in order for a
person to be in pain from these problems
he/she must lose as much as 60% of the
nerve function in that region.
Therefore, if you or a loved one are interested
in discovering and experiencing the full bene-
fits that chiropractic care can provide please
mention this article when calling our office,
Total Health Chiropractic at 908-231-8088
and our staff will be happy to set up a com-
plimentary consultation in order to discover
how we may help your health care needs.
PAGE 60
Health and Wellness
