Best Treatment for Disc Bulges in Reading, PA
Hey guys, Dr. McClimon back with McClimon Chiropractic. Today, we’re going to talk about two of our favorite treatments to relieve pressure and pain from disc bulges, protrusions, and herniations.
How Disc Problems Affect the Nerves
I’m sure you guys have heard of those terms. There are different phases: bulge, protrusion, and herniation. But no matter what phase you’re in, it’s creating pressure on your nerve because the disc has basically bulged out, impacting the nerve and what that nerve controls in your body.
Specific Chiropractic Adjustments
Our traditional approach, guys, is that we check posture, check balance, take X-rays, and evaluate the structure.
When there’s a misalignment within that structure, that misalignment can create pressure on the disc, which can cause it to bulge and put more pressure on your nerve. We make specific adjustments to those levels to realign the spine, which takes pressure off the disc and the nerve and allows your body to function properly without medications or surgeries.
The specific chiropractic adjustment does help those things.
Flexion Distraction
One of the other treatments we’ve found to be very, very effective over the years is what we call flexion distraction. This is a flexion distraction table, and this treatment is a little different from the traditional adjustment.
It focuses specifically on getting a disc bulge to retract and resorb back into its proper position.
In a healthy spine, we have a disc and a nerve hole that’s open, and there’s lots of space around that nerve. When you have a disc bulge, the disc bulges out. In the worst case, the annulus ruptures, the jelly material sticks out, and it creates more inflammation and pressure around that nerve root, affecting that nerve and what it controls in your body. And yes, sometimes that’s painful.
How Flexion Distraction Works
Flexion distraction is a technique where we lay you flat on your belly. This table actually bends down, and when we do that, we open the space around the disc bulge you have in there.
When we open that space, it lowers the intradiscal pressure inside that disc and gets the disc to suck back in. We open it and do flexion. It lowers intradiscal pressure and can get that disc material to resorb and suck back into the space, getting pressure off the nerve.
Addressing the Root Cause
This is really addressing the root cause of the problem rather than just masking it with a medication or an injection. Those things can be effective symptomatically, but are they really addressing the root cause? No. That’s the difference.
Surgery does address the root cause. However, it’s more invasive. This is really going to be your best conservative option before going that surgical route.
Checking Your Spine
If you’ve never tried flexion distraction or specific chiropractic adjustments and you’ve had pain and disc problems over the years, I highly recommend that you check your spine.
We check that structure and can evaluate the MRI results to see the extent of it. I’m going to say 95% of patients do get better with these treatments and don’t have to have surgery.
If you’re struggling and you’ve never had your spine checked, we highly recommend that you do that. This is very effective and safe, and it really can help get you out of pain and back to living the life that you love.
That’s our tip for today, guys, and we look forward to seeing you in our next video. God bless.
