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All About Sciatica
Dr. Don Parkerson, Jr.
If you’ve ever experienced sciatica, I don’t have to
tell you how painful this condition can be.
But, I can tell you that there is a painless treatment option that
doesn’t involve drugs or surgery and is very effective in most cases.
What is Sciatica?
Your sciatic nerve is the biggest and longest nerve
in your body. It begins in the lower
back as 5 smaller nerves joining together and travels down to your pelvis,
buttocks, thigh, knee, calf, foot, and toes.
When the sciatic nerve becomes inflamed, the
condition is called sciatica and can be intensely painful. This pain has the potential to affect any or
all of the areas the sciatic nerve passes through.
Most commonly, sciatic pain will affect the buttocks
and back of the leg on one side.
However, some patients may have sciatic symptoms on the side of the leg
or even the front outside portion of the thigh and some patients may have the
unfortunate experience of having sciatica in both legs.
The pain itself is often described as a burning pain
shooting down the leg, but some patients experience numbness and tingling in
the legs and feet as a result of sciatica.
What Causes Sciatica?
The most common cause of sciatica is irritation of
the sciatic nerve roots by a lumbar disc problem. Disc problems are common following accidents,
injuries, and spinal misalignment.
The discs of the lumbar spine
may bulge or herniate, which causes irritation and inflammation of the sciatic
nerve roots at that level.
In some cases of advanced
spinal degeneration, patients may have sciatica caused by a condition called
spinal stenosis, which is a narrowing of the spinal canal that can also
irritate the sciatic nerve.
What is the medical
treatment for sciatica?
The
medical treatment of sciatica typically involves several phases of care:
1.
Medication – the
first option and least invasive of medical care. This may involve a combination of
anti-inflammatory meds, muscle relaxers, and/or pain-killers.
2.
Physical Therapy
– various forms of exercises and traction may be used to try to relieve
sciatica.
3.
MRI – this
diagnostic test can determine if there is a bulged or herniated disc that could
be causing the sciatica.
4.
Epidural Steroid
Injections - if a disc bulge or herniation is detected by MRI, a series of 3
epidural injections are typically ordered.
The goal of these injections is to reduce swelling and inflammation in
the disc bulge or herniation by injecting cortisone into the spine.
5.
Surgery – if the
medications and epidurals aren’t effective and the MRI showed a disc problem
that warranted it, spinal surgery may be the next step in the medical process.
Sciatica and the Upper
Cervical Adjustment
Like all nerves in the body, the sciatic nerve’s
roots begin in the brain and must first travel through the 1st
vertebra of the spine (the atlas) before reaching their destination in the
lumbar and sacral spine.
Often,
it is at this highest level of the spine where spinal misalignment and
imbalance first begins. Misalignment in
the cervical spine affects each spinal area below it, including the lumbar and
sacral regions where the sciatic nerve exits the spine.
The
upper cervical adjustment restores the entire spine to its proper balance by
correcting the cervical alignment. By
correcting this spinal misalignment in the head and neck region, the mid-back,
lumbar, and pelvis regions of the spine are also realigned and balanced
properly.
Sciatica and Leg Length
Perhaps, the most important function of the upper
cervical adjustment is the balancing of leg lengths. Those of you who are patients in our clinic
understand the great strides we take to ensure that our patients’ legs are balanced
precisely. We even use bowling shoes to
increase the accuracy of our leg length analysis.
Research
has shown the connection between sciatica and having a functional leg length
inequality. By short leg, I am referring to a leg being
functionally shorter because of spinal imbalance, which does not mean that one
leg actually developed differently than the other.
Dr.
James Cox found in his research that sciatica predominantly occurs on the
opposite side of a short leg. In other
words, if you have sciatica in your right leg, it is likely that your left leg
is shorter than your right. A simple
test while lying on your back may show this to be true.
This
balancing of the legs restores the proper alignment to the hips, pelvis, and
lumbar spine, thus reducing any pressure on the lumbar discs. It is often the discs of the lumbar spine
that are irritating the sciatic nerve roots, and by easing the pressure on the
discs, the sciatic pain is thereby relieved.
For further information on this topic, you may contact
Dr. Parkerson at 770.952.5353, by email at Parkerson@humberparkerson.com,
or visit our clinic on the web at www.HumberParkerson.com.
The Highest Level is the monthly e-mail newsletter of
the
© Humber Parkerson
Clinic 2006
July 2006 issue of The Highest Level
