Imagine this. You’ve been in a car accident. It was a head-on collision and there was whiplash. Your head flew forward, impacting with the windshield, then backyards, harming your neck. You feel a large amount of pain in your back. You think your back is broken. One thing leads to another. A spinal expert looks at you. The diagnosis is not good.
Back pain affects millions of Americans. It can be lower back pain, mid back pain, or upper back pain and it really doesn’t matter in the end. It is pain. People suffer with it, day in and day out, struggling to perform basic tasks. Walking is difficult. Running is nearly impossible. Sitting in a chair hurts. Everything is affected.
There are some statistics worth noting right off the back. They have to do with different kinds of back injuries. Some are bulging discs and others are chronic pain. Either way, a life is affected. The statistics are:
- Worldwide, over 1.5 billion people suffer from chronic pain.
- 37% of Americans who experience low back pain never seek professional help.
- Almost 59% of chronic-pain sufferers reported an impact on their overall enjoyment of life.
- According to a recent study by the Annals of Rheumatic Diseases, 10% of people worldwide are afflicted with lower back pain, making it the world?s leading cause of disability.
- According to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, 80% of adults experience low back pain at some point in their lifetimes.
- Degenerative disc disease (DDD) is fairly common; an estimated 30% of people aged 30 to 50 years old will have some degree of disc space degeneration.
Yes, those are a lot of statistics. But they matter and mean something in this article. Chronic pain can go along with degenerative disc disease. One of the causes of chronic back pain is DDD. This is serious. And think about this: Lower back pain is the leading cause of disability around the world, over many other illnesses and chronic symptoms.
A person with back pain struggles. He struggles with the ability to get around, to run, to walk, to enjoy life. It may have an effect on his mood. He may struggle to be happy, to think positively, especially if every thought is interrupted by a great deal of pain. He may get crank, may get angry. This could affect his wife, his children.
There are many causes of back pain. The conditions go by many names and sometimes by treatments. They are scoliosis treatment, sciatica pain relief, spinal fusion surgery, spinal pain, severe back pain, peripheral neuropathy, outpatient spine surgery, spinal decompression, and more.
The treatment for back pain depends on the cause. Sometimes, two of the lumbar in the spine have shifted, causing a near break or a break. This can happen in the aforementioned example of the car accident. Here, spinal fusion surgery would be useful to repair the damage.
There is sciatica as well. This deals with the nerves in a certain part of the body. In this case, a specific treatment called sciatica nerve treatment would be used to help the sufferer get relief from the condition. There are many conditions and many treatments. Seeing a spinal surgeon can help.
When back pain becomes so severe, a person might see a doctor. This doctor may be qualified or not qualified. This is important. Finding the best doctor to treat the condition you have will help you out in the long run. Here, there is opportunity. Getting the best treatment gives you the best chance of recovery.
Eventually, a person might be recommended for surgery. The same deal follows here. The best surgeon gives a patient the best chance of getting better. That might mean walking again. That might mean repairing the nerves in a body. That might mean decreasing or eliminating that back pain.
Plus, there are complications. A surgery can have complications, just like any other form of treatment can have. A surgeon who is not as skilled as another may damage part of the body that the more experienced surgeon would have avoided.
A spine surgery center can afford the most options. A spine surgery center will have multiple surgeons for the job. There are many perks to a spine surgery center. It will have, as every spine surgery center has, a good staff.
