Sciatic Nerve Pain

Archive for December, 2009

Have you ever experienced a literal pain in the butt that continues all the way down your leg? Has it ever felt like someone was sticking a hot poker into your leg? If either of these scenarios is familiar to you, you’ve probably suffered from sciatica, a pain in the sciatic nerve. No one experiencing sciatica wants it to stick around any longer than, well, at all, so let’s not delay in discovering how you can make your leg pain a distant memory.

To understand and defeat the beast that is sciatica, it will be helpful to understand what it is and what causes it. The sciatic nerve is the largest nerve in your body, which starts in the low back and travels all the way down your legs to the bottom of your feet. It controls nearly everything within your legs: from the large hamstring and quadriceps muscles in your upper legs to the smallest blood vessels in the bottom of your feet.

Sciatica is quite simply irritation of the sciatic nerve. This can happen several different ways at a few different points in the nerve’s journey from the low back to and through the leg.

Frequently sciatic nerve pain is a result of the joints in your lower spine being poorly aligned and putting pressure or stretching on the nerves as they come off from your spine. This problem is called a subluxation and is diagnosed and treated by chiropractors. Sciatica can also commonly occur due to spasm of a muscle in the buttock called the piriformis muscle. The sciatic nerve passes under this muscle as it travels through the pelvis near the hip down to the back of your leg. This problem is frequently treated by physical therapists, chiropractors and massage therapists.

If you aren’t able to get in to the chiropractor or physical therapist right away or you hope to help improve your situation at least in part on your own, here are some tips to help relieve the pain associated with sciatica.

Give it a rest. Exercise is a great asset to getting and staying healthy, but when your sciatic nerve is unhappy, exercise will frequently flare up your problem and slow your progress. Especially if the piriformis muscle is involved, exercise which causes pounding, such as walking, running, tennis, basketball, soccer, etc., will flare the piriformis spasm and put additional strain on the spine in the lower part of the back.

Take a break from your regular exercise routine to give your sciatic nerve a break. If you simply must exercise, try non-impact exercises of the upper body, like resistive exercise band exercise or exercise ball exercises. Swimming may be a helpful alternative to your regular routine as well.

Stretch yourself. Relaxing the muscles in the lower back, buttocks and upper legs through stretching will help reduce the strain on the sciatic nerve and the joints throughout the lower back and pelvis. Always stretch gently and avoid any further stretching if it causes sharp pain or if it aggravates your problem.

Stretching the piriformis muscle can be done several different ways. However, when your sciatic nerve is screaming, the easiest stretch involves lying on your back with your knees bent and pulling one knee at a time up towards the opposite shoulder and holding it for 5-30 seconds. You will know you are getting a good stretch when you feel a mild stretch in the buttocks near the hip.

Chill out. Ice will be your best friend when you are suffering from sciatica. Placing a cold pack or ice pack on the lower spine, tailbone and/or buttock for 20 minutes once every 2-3 hours will help reduce swelling and also reduce pain. It is important to use ice exclusively at the onset of sciatica, as it has been found to decrease the length of time needed for healing.

If after 4-5 days you choose to alternate ice and heat, keep it off from the spine and limit heat use, especially with a heating pad, to no more than 20 minutes. Avoid sleeping while applying heat, as it can cause burns and can dry out the tissues, slowing the healing process.

Get it straight. Your posture plays an important role in the health of your spine. Sitting and standing as straight as is comfortably possible will help to reduce the effects of nerve irritation and get your nerves healing quicker and more completely. Avoid sitting in soft couches or chairs, as they will not give you the support that you need to sit well. Instead, drag a kitchen chair into the living room and spend your time sitting in a more supportive chair. Use a back support cushions in every chair you sit in; whether at work, in the car or at home to help support your back properly.

Move it! While sitting in a straight-back chair is helpful in supporting your lower back and spine, be sure that you aren’t sitting for any longer than 15-20 minutes at a time. Lack of movement in the joints of the spine especially can cause further damage, stiffness and muscle strain. Getting up and moving frequently, even if only to stretch or walk gently around the room will help to keep circulation fresh and facilitate a quicker recovery. Be sure that you stay well within your limits; if you are pushing yourself too hard and it is causing pain, then stop and give yourself a rest.

Get some sleep. Sleep is one of the most critical components in helping start and in maintaining a healing process. When you sleep, your body does its best work of healing and repairs the damage done throughout the day. Following any injury or during any illness, regular sleep is critical in helping your body get the upper hand.

Drink like a fish. To drink like a fish, you need to drink what a fish drinks: water, lots and lots of water. When your body isn’t hydrated properly, the tissues become tacky and adhesions form. If adhesions form, this slows the healing process and causes increased scar formation. Adhesions can form between your sciatic nerve and the surrounding tissues, causing your healing process to be incomplete and leaving you vulnerable to frequent, repeated sciatic episodes.

Put on some relief. Topical analgesics can help alleviate some of the bite of the pain of sciatica while helping soothe the spasm in the muscles of the low back, buttocks and upper leg. Getting even temporary relief from your sciatica can help your healing process by providing you an opportunity to rest or sleep.

Go for a massage. It stands to reason that if your sciatica is due to irritation of the sciatic nerve from spasm of your piriformis, hamstring or lower back muscles, deep tissue massage can be of great benefit to you. Getting a massage or even using a massager at home that is able to get into the deeper tissues of the buttocks and low back may help relieve some or all of your sciatic pain. At the very least, it can help to reduce the stress that commonly accumulates when you are in pain.

Get professional help. It is always a good idea to seek help from a chiropractor, medical doctor, physical therapist or massage therapist when you experience pain in the low back and/or legs. Waiting too long to effectively treat a condition involving your nerves can cause problems as mild as missing time from work all the way up to irreversible nerve damage. It is wise to effectively and completely deal with any problems involving your nerves, as doing so will help prevent similar problems from rearing their ugly head again down the road.

Even if you end up seeking professional help to deal with sciatica, incorporating practical home care can help shorten your recovery time and get you out of pain quicker. If pain in your buttocks and legs is something that you would rather avoid than deal with again, use these tips regularly to give yourself the best chance of preventing sciatica for years to come.

The better you take care of yourself, the greater health and vitality you will enjoy.

Nick Preston
http://www.articlesbase.com/non-fiction-articles/sciatica-how-can-you-get-rid-of-your-pain-in-the-butt-66603.html

Back pain is the second most health problem in U.S. In general terms, almost every person faces back pain at some point in their lives. Back pain can turn your pain into a chronic pain or acute pain which can put you into a serious health dilemma. Sometime it becomes difficult to detect the pain of your back. You can face back pain problems like lower back pain, upper back pain, spine back pain, chronic back pain or acute back pain.

Firstly, you need to know about your back pain symptoms and causes then the second step should be to treat it in the most efficient way to get the positive result. You can try out some homely exercise in to do lit bit stressing and stretching workouts to feel the pleasure of fast relief. Just make it a point to spare some half an hour or one hour time for your personal health in order to relieve yourself from chronic or acute back pain. At the times of back ache someone may feels to keep taking rest for a long time in bed and clearly it can be said that you are walking on a wrong path. It is highly advisable to keep yourself active in doing some little exercise which helps to avoid straining of muscles and get relief from pain.

You should also know the type of back pain you are suffering. Take some expert guide or under some physique build-up trainer to follow healthy exercise. You can even opt for morning walk to freshen up yourself. In initial stages just avoid brisk walk as already you are undergoing severe back ache. Rightly it is said that prevention is better than cure as any person will try to get relief from back ache as soon as possible. Even ice packs and massages can also be the source to relieve the acute pain of your back. The ice packs can be the anti agent to fight against the pain relieving muscles.

With the changing time you may also get astonished if came to know that the people also take appointments in a spa. Now-a-days people paying equal attention to spas and gaining much of fame for back pain relief because they provide massages and Jacuzzis. Jacuzzi is a grand place to relax and but it can be only a temporary solution. The heating pad can be the most effective way to treat and stay away from lower back pain relief.

Thus, back pain relief is an important task to be dealt with it. Every person’s health is of significance so it becomes your personal duty to overcome from your back ache problem within short time. Do healthy exercise in order to heal your pain.

Bella Mclaine
http://www.articlesbase.com/diseases-and-conditions-articles/remedies-nerve-pain-relief-713260.html

Your back is a vital body part. It plays an essential role in every part of daily life. Since the back is so important, you want to keep up-to-date on information about back pain and its treatment.

Begin with this basic information.

Information on Back Pain #1 – What Is Your Back?

Back pain can best be understood when you understand the structure of your back, so let’s build a spine. Your back consists of 30 small bones called vertebrae. These bones are stacked on top of each other, and connected by ligaments, tendons, and muscles. Your stack of connected vertebrae is divided into four regions. From the base of your skull down to your pelvis, these four regions are:

1. Cervical or neck vertebrae – the top 7

2. Thoracic or upper back vertebrae – the next 12

3. Lumbar or lower back vertebrae – 5 more

4. Sacrum and coccyx – 6 fused bones at the spine’s base

Between your vertebrae are round, spongy cartilage pads called disks. Disks act as shock absorbers for your spine. A column-like spinal cord runs through your stack of vertebrae. It, too, is divided into segments similar to nearby vertebrae. Your spinal cord contains nerve roots and nerve rootlets that spread out, sending messages of pain from your back to your brain.

Information on Back Pain #2 – Back Pain’s Causes

Back pain is among the most common complaints. It is also one of the most painful. Since it can be difficult to treat, it is important that you have good information on back pain. Most good information on back pain will agree that when you lift something too heavy, you may cause a sprain, pull, strain, or spasm in one of the muscles or ligaments in your back. That will cause back pain.

Let’s look at more specific information on back pain.

1. Your cervical spine, or upper back, begins at the base of your skull. It is composed of seven vertebrae with eight pairs of cervical nerves. This part of your spine is designed to support your head and give you mobility.

Injury or mild trauma to the cervical spine can cause one of a number of serious, even life-threatening medical emergencies. You might have a spinal cord injury (SCI) or a fracture. Such injury could cause pain, numbness, weakness, and tingling.

2. Your thoracic spine is just below your cervical spine. Your ribs are connected to this part of the spine. Think of it as the back of your chest. Your thoracic spine is designed to be strong and stable, permitting you to stand upright and protecting your vital internal chest organs. Although thoracic, or middle back pain is rather uncommon, it causes significant pain when it does occur.

The most common causes of middle back pain are muscular irritation and joint dysfunction. You may injure a disk, and cause middle back pain, but such injuries are very rare.

3. Your lumbar spine, or lower back region, is most likely to experience pain. This is because your lumbar region supports the weight of your upper body. It takes the most abuse.

Many things can cause injury and pain to your lower back. As with all parts of the spine, muscle strain or spasm may occur when you lift or carry things that are too heavy. Sprains of ligaments occur in similar manner. You may experience joint problems or a “slipped disk.”

The most common cause of lumbar or lower back pain, though, is simply using your back muscles for actions you usually do not do. Perhaps you sit at a desk most days, but one weekend, you help friends move furniture. Or you normally teach school, but during the summer, you decide to create a large vegetable garden in your back yard.

A so-called “slipped disk” (herniated disk) occurs when a disk, one of those spongy cartilage pads between your spines vertebrae bulges out and presses on nerves. This often occurs when you twisting while lifting something. You may not know what caused your slipped disk, if it happens. You will know the lower back pain that comes as a result.

Information on Back Pain #3 – Back Pain and Your Physician

Not every back pain will require a visit to your physician. Many back pains can be treated effectively at home with heating pads and ice packs. Over-the-counter (OTC) medications can also give the relief needed. However, there are times when you will want your physician to give information on back pain, and prescribe treatment.

Seek a qualified physician if any of the following is true:

• Your pain is so bad you can’t move around

• Your pain is not less after two weeks

• Your pain was caused by an injury

• You have a fever

• You feel nauseous or are vomiting

• You have a stomachache

• You are weak or sweating

• Your pain goes down the leg below your knee

• You lose control over going to the bathroom

• Your foot, leg, rectal, or groin area is numb

Information on Back Pain #4 – Back Pain Prevention

Your health care provider, whether physician, chiropractor or other, will encourage you to maintain an active, healthy lifestyle as part of back pain prevention. The best information on back pain they can provide you is to avoid injury in the first place. Develop healthy back habits. The following five bad habits can cause back pain. Avoid them.

• Twisting when lifting

• Bad posture

• Lack of exercise and too much weight

• Smoking tobacco

• Ignoring back pain

The more information on back pain you have, the better prepared you will be to deal with it.

Anna Hart
http://www.articlesbase.com/health-articles/information-on-back-pain-keeping-your-back-straight-94494.html

One of the top reasons that people miss school, work, and other things is due to lower back pain. This is a very common problem that can begin as a small pain and steadily increase over time or it could begin as a serious pain that needs immediate attention from a physician. There are some treatments for lower back pain, but often it can be difficult for people to completely get rid of the pain. Since this problem is causing so many people to miss out on obligations, it is a huge concern for physicians.

Sometimes lower back pain can move down the buttocks and legs, creating other problems. Often the pain is the result of nerves being pinched due to poor posture, straining of the muscles, and other problems. When there is a lot of pressure on the nerves in the lower back it is called sciatica. This is an incredibly painful problem and can last for a long time. Other causes of lower back pain come from being overweight and putting too much pressure on the lower back, sitting or standing in one position for too long without stretching or exercising, etc.

Ways To Relieve Lower Back Pain

The first thing you need to do when you experience lower back pain is to discover the source of the pain. Once you know what caused your pain, you will have a better idea of how to treat it. For example if you pain comes from sitting too long with poor posture, you may consider getting a back brace that helps you maintain better posture and take frequent breaks to stretch you back. If your lower back pain is the result of an injury, you may only be able to get pain relievers and take it easy for a while until the body naturally heals itself. Sometimes lower back pain requires surgery in the back in order to be relieved. Often when you don’t have any reason for having the lower back pain, you could have a serious problem and need to have it checked out immediately.

Serious conditions that can cause lower back pain include arthritis, scoliosis, or even cancer. The best thing is to seek treatment as soon as you detect the problem. That way you are more likely to take care of the problem before it gets worse. People that are known for treating lower back pain include physicians, osteopaths, chiropractors, and acupuncturists. If you are unsure what is causing the pain, it is recommended that you first see your primary practitioner and then go from there. For more information on lower back pain and its treatment, begin searching online. You may be able to discover a possible source for you lower back pain that you never considered before.

DOLA RAHEEM
http://www.articlesbase.com/health-articles/suffering-from-lower-back-pain-108981.html

There are many different exercises and stretches you can do for lower back pain treatment. Lower back pain is one of the most common ailments. It doesn’t matter what age you are back pain can be a problem. Lower back pain treatment can be in the form of exercise and physical therapy or professional treatment as it all depends on the severity of the back problem. The back is one of the most important areas to keep healthy in order to have the ability to move around without pain.

One of the most effective things you can do if you feel a bit of strain in your back is simple stretches. By stretching your back and abdomen muscles those muscles will become stronger. When those muscles are strengthened there is less chance of the occurrence of back troubles considering the strength of the muscles to begin with. lower back pain treatment, in terms of stretching, will also loosen the muscle up making them warm and letting the blood flow throughout the muscle. There are many different types of stretches for lower back pain treatment. You doctor will be able to suggest several that should help you.

If stretching isn’t working you may consider consulting a chiropractor. Many times lower back pain can be caused by different parts of the back not being aligned. By consulting a chiropractor they can tell you if everything in your back is how it should be. Not being aligned is one of the biggest causes of back problems. Lower back pain treatment is a specialty of many chiropractors as there are so many back problems that people have.

If you are feeling pain in your back because of an injury try applying heat to the area. Using heat loosens up the back and causes the back to become less stiff. This form of treatment generally alleviates the pain at first but finding out what is wrong with your back will only help the healing process in the long run.

The last option is surgery. This is definitely the final option if stretching and exercises do not work. Surgery for lower back pain treatment is only contemplated if there are no other option or if the other options do not work. Any type of surgery comes with risks so it’s important to be certain that it’s the only choice that is left. Lower back pain treatment is all about alleviating the discomfort you feel in the back which can be the most uncomfortable and annoying back problem. If stretching and exercising do not work something more drastic such as surgery may be your best option.

Dave W Jones
http://www.articlesbase.com/health-articles/lower-back-pain-treatment-solutions-63710.html