Spinal stenosis can lead to nerve compression or irritation that causes chronic back pain and symptoms like weakness and unpleasant prickling or cramping sensations. If you're suffering from symptoms of spinal stenosis, the board-certified pain management specialists at Lynx Healthcare in Albuquerque, New Mexico, can help. They offer both conservative physical therapy and interventional pain management treatments like regenerative medicine and spinal injections to relieve your pain. To find out more, call or use the online booking tool today.
Spinal stenosis is a term used when back conditions cause your spinal column to get narrower. This narrowing leaves insufficient room for the nerves exiting your spinal cord and can cause irritation and compression that leads to back pain.
The conditions that typically cause spinal stenosis develop over time due to wear-and-tear and the effects of aging on your spine. These conditions include:
The discs that cushion your vertebrae have a high water content when you're young, making them flexible and shock absorbent. Over the years, they dry out, getting stiffer and flatter, which alters the alignment of your vertebrae and causes spinal stenosis.
Osteoarthritis can affect the facet joints linking your vertebrae, leading to inflammation and increased pressure on the joints. This causes the narrowing of spinal stenosis, which worsens if bone spurs also develop.
These bony outgrowths are your body's attempt to shore up weak or diseased vertebrae, but in many instances, bone spurs just add to the problem and make spinal stenosis worse.
Other causes of spinal stenosis include spinal trauma, herniated discs, spinal tumors, and Paget's disease, which causes an overgrowth of bone.
Spinal stenosis might cause:
Symptoms of spinal stenosis are often worse when you're walking and tend to ease if you sit down. Leaning forward can also help as it takes the pressure off your spinal nerves.
The focus of spinal stenosis treatment at Lynx Healthcare is to reduce the pressure on your spinal nerves. Therapies the team might include in your personalized treatment plan include:
The chances are good that a combination of these conservative treatments relieves your pain and other spinal stenosis symptoms. If you've been following your treatment plan for some time without success, you might need to consider other options like laminectomy or spinal decompression.
If you have symptoms of spinal stenosis or other chronic back problems, call Lynx Healthcare to schedule a consultation or book online today.
