HEP: Low Back Pain (Spinal Stenosis)
Patient Education
What’s going on?
Your spine is made up of your bones (vertebrae) and cushioning discs (intervertebral discs). These structures protect your spinal cord and nerves.
As nerves in your body travel from the spinal cord toward your arms and legs, the nerve can get irritated or may not move very well. This limits the ability of the nerves to glide alongside the adjoining tissues
When the nerve gets irritated you can experience a sharp, shooting pain or numbness/tingling down a specific area of your leg especially when you compress the nerves by extending or rotating your back.
How long will it take?
Most people with lower back pain that recently occurred will recover in six weeks.
In some conditions that are more chronic, it may take longer, but research has shown that physical therapy can be effective for reducing your symptoms and improving your function.
How will we treat your condition at IHSM?
At IHSM, a doctor of physical therapy will perform a detailed physical examination to understand how you move and all the structures that could be contributing to your pain; including nerves, joints, and muscles in your back and legs.
Your treatment may include mobilizations to your back, flexion biased exercises, mechanical traction, manual stretches that can help the nerve move better.
It is likely that your therapist will perform mobilizations to improve the flexibility of your hips and thorax.
Nerve mobility exercises are a series of movements that will move the nerve and open up the pathway allowing the nerve to slide freely again.
With treatment, your leg pain and back pain should lessen and you should begin to feel more flexibility in your back. If at any point the leg pain gets worse or your muscles become weaker, stop the exercises and speak with your clinician at IHSM about it.
What can you do to help yourself?
Perform exercises regularly that emphasize a flexed or bent posture to reduce compression on sensitive nerves.
Perform exercises that will main the flexibility of the tissues in the thorax and hips.
Perform the exercises that your physical therapist taught you that improve the mobility of your nerves.
Instructions:
You can do the first 4 exercises to begin. You can continue with the rest of the exercises as the pain decreases.
About IHSM
Integrative Health and Sports Medicine, LLC is a one-stop health and wellness center. Our mission is to restore our patients to a healthy, pain-free, and productive life. By combining orthopedic physical therapy techniques, sports medicine, acupuncture, and Chinese medicine, we can treat conditions and achieve results in cases that have not responded well to modern Western medicine.
We are located in Cincinnati, Ohio. Please email us at info@ihsm.org to schedule a consultation and let us help you on your journey to optimal health.