Spinal stenosis. Symptoms. Tests. Predictors of treatment outcomes.
Procedures. The world of spinal stenosis can be daunting. For the McHenry
back pain or neck pain sufferer who hears that he or she has spinal stenosis, that
world just needs to be simplified. What is spinal stenosis? What is happening
to my spine? What can be done about the pain? OrthoIllinois Chiropractic appreciates these
questions, has answers, and a means to reduce the pain.
First, what is spinal stenosis? The narrowing of spaces in
the spine which causes pressure on the spinal cord and nerves usually resulting
in pain. The narrowing can be due to disc degeneration or a disc herniation or
any number of other spinal conditions that can disrupt the painfree support of the spine. That’s where your McHenry
chiropractor comes into play with a thorough clinical examination and
diagnosis.
Now, the diagnosis of spinal stenosis may just be made
simpler with the release of this interesting paper. It puts
forth that spinal stenosis can be diagnosed in less than 7 questions, even just 6 questions may allow the diagnosis with an 80% accuracy rate! These questions come with international
consensus which is tough to come by. What are those questions? Do you experience...
- "leg or buttock pain while walking"
- "flex forward to relieve symptoms"
- "feel relief when using a shopping cart or
bicycle"
- "motor or sensory disturbance while
walking"
- "normal and symmetric foot pulses"
- "lower extremity weakness"
- "low back pain"
Who knew that leaning on the shopping cart while going to
the McHenry grocery store could tell so much!? Well, the authors explain
that these items may lead to cost-effective treatment, improved
healthcare utilization and boosted patient outcomes. (1) Those
kind of outcomes are just what OrthoIllinois Chiropractic wants for our McHenry
patients.
Meanwhile other sets of researchers are studying other
factors that may predict how well a lumbar spinal stenosis patient will respond
to non-surgical care. Such patient-input factors as visual analog scale (VAS)responses
that patients can rate their pain (“on a scale of 1 to 10, one being no pain to
10 being the worst pain I’ve ever felt…”) and more formal assessment tools like
the Swiss Spinal Stenosis Questionnaire are showing promise. (2) Other more
objective factors like the presence of only radicular symptoms, absence of
other issues like degenerative spondylolisthesis/scoliosis, and an illness
lasting less than one year are also proving helpful. (3) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic always
uses a variety of tools, a combination of patient-input as well as objective factors,
in diagnosing spinal stenosis and establishing a treatment plan.
McHenry spinal stenosis patients are assured an individualized plan
for their back pain relief.
So check out a bit more about spinal stenosis keeping in mind that it may
affect the cervical, thoracic or lumbar spine and how it disturbs the spine’s design to
cause pain. Then, contact OrthoIllinois Chiropractic to set up a McHenry
chiropractic appointment during which a thorough examination reveals the
diagnosis upon which a treatment plan is made and shared with you for relief of
your spinal stenosis pain.