Physical Therapy Over Spine Surgery: Success Story 36 Year Old Female Avoids Back Surgery
Physical Therapy Trumps Surgery
Meghan came to see Dr. Amanda after getting the run around at the hospital and doctor’s offices. What led her to the emergency room was a couple wrong moves and shooting pain down her leg accompanied with leg weakness.
This was of course very scary for Meghan so she went to the ER where she received pain medication and imaging to diagnose the injury. The MRI showed a large disc extrusion. A disc extrusion is a type of herniation where the soft material of the disc bulges out of the fibrous outer ring. This can cause compression of the nerve, and if bad enough can cause pain and weakness to your lower extremities.
Meghan started a physical therapy program few weeks after the initial incident to try to get help, as the medication was not touching it. She also did not want to have surgery. Many may think a bulging disc requires surgery to heal especially if it is causing radicular symptoms ( aka leg pain and weakness), but this is not the case. Bulging discs can be treated conservatively through physical therapy!
After about a month of treatment with Dr. Amanda, Meghan’s symptoms continued to decrease and her pain was centralizing-meaning decreasing in her legs and localizing in her back. This made it easier for her to tolerate a full work day on her feet!
The first phase of her treatment was to decrease her pain and teach her how to move safely without re-injuring herself. She learned positions of relief and how to manage the pain. The second phase focused on building up strength in her legs and core. Nerve compression causes leg weakness because the nerve is unable to send the signal to the muscle to work properly. And then weakness causes abnormal gait patterns like drop foot. Meghan was having difficulty lifting up her foot while walking, making her unsteady. However as the disc moved off her nerve with specific exercises and manual techniques, her strength slowly improved.
Her recovery program focused on gradually increasing her leg and core strength which in turn normalized her walking patterns and eliminated the drop foot. The last phase of therapy was the performance phase. At this point her pain was gone and she focused on building up even more strength compared to before the injury because did not want this to happen again!
The goal of physical therapy is not just to get people out of pain, but get people to return to their prior level of function and even stronger than before! At Restore Physical Therapy, we take our patients to the next level to ensure prevention of further injuries.
Meghan did great and was able to avoid surgery! Her treatment plan was about 3 months and she was discharged with a maintenance program to maintain her strength and mobility gains.
If you are suffering with low back or have been told you have bulging discs that can only get fixed with medication and surgery, its important you know YOU have other options. Just like Meghan you too can heal and get back to normal without surgery!
If you would like to talk to a PT on the phone today about your back pain click the link below!
Or check out our guide to low back pain to start helping yourself today!