Back Pain Treatment in Ponsonby

Poor posture is essentially ‘micro trauma’ over long periods of time and is the most common cause of SI subluxation. The SI joints can be subluxated by too much sustained flexion, extension or torsion. Sitting in a car or at a desk for hours at a time creates too much flexion, which causes straining of posterior ligaments. Sleeping prone, or face down, often creates too much extension, which causes compression in the SI joint. Leg-crossing while sitting or laying supine, or face up, often creates too much torsion, which strains ligaments and misaligns the SI joint surface.

Unexpected jarring-type accidents, such as slips and falls or tripping, are the most common traumas leading to SI subluxation because of the compression force transmitted into the joint, which either slightly misaligns or ‘jams’. Car accidents can cause SI subluxations, but this force is usually of a shearing nature. Sport injuries, depending on the nature of the impact, can cause subluxations due to either compression or shearing forces. A subluxated SI joint can affect surrounding blood flow, nerve function and muscle tension.

Women are at risk for developing SI joint problems in pregnancy and after childbirth. During pregnancy a female hormone is released that allows the ligaments in the pelvis to relax. This is necessary so that during a normal birth, the female pelvis can stretch enough to allow the baby through the ring of the pelvis. This stretching results in changes to the SI joints, making them ‘hyper mobile’ – extra or overly mobile, thus vulnerable to injury. During pregnancy, the SI joints can cause discomfort both from the effects of the hormones that loosen the joints, and from the stress of carrying a growing baby in the pelvis, and from fixations that may form in the sacroiliac joint. Fairly commonly too pregnant women suffer from pubic bone pain that may continue long after the pregnancy.

Both osteoarthritis—the ‘wear and tear’ type, and inflammatory types of arthritis such as gout, psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis and ankylosing spondylitis cause SI joint destruction. Joint destruction invariably causes misalignments and dysfunction. SI subluxations created from mild to moderate arthritis can become unstable with movement and often create popping or clicking sounds, although severe arthritis often leads to complete SI fusion.

Imbalance

Any condition that causes an abnormal walking pattern increases stress on the SI joints. This includes having one leg shorter than the other, a previously fractured femur (thigh bone), chronic leg-crossing; obesity; and any sort of limping due to pain in the hip, knee, ankle, or foot.

Piriformis Syndrome

The piriformis muscle is a small muscle in the middle of your buttock. If the piriformis muscle goes into spasm and becomes inflamed, it will affect the sacroiliac joint and cause extreme SI joint pain. Also, since the sciatic nerve runs underneath the piriformis muscle, when the piriformis muscle becomes tight and inflamed it can irritate the sciatic nerve and cause severe pain in the buttocks and down the leg. This pain is commonly mistaken for ‘sciatica’ related to a disc bulge (slipped disc).

Sacroiliac

joint injuries are treated through the use of spinal manipulation (spinal adjusting) to re-position the joint to its optimal bio-mechanical position to promote healing in proper spinal alignment.

What Is A Disc Herniation? A Disc Prolapse? OR A Slipped Disc?

Disc herniation, disc prolapse, and slipped discs are all the same things just different names. A vertebral disc is made from 2 main parts: the nucleus pulposus (the liquid in the centre of the disc) and the outer annulus fibres. A disc herniation is when the nucleus pulposus leaks out of the weak disc and compresses on the nerves. As a result, back pain, extremity numbness, tingling and even weakness in severe cases.

What Attributes To A Disc Herniation/Prolapse?

Disc herniations can occur in both the neck and the low back. Usually disc herniation in the neck occurs due to repetitive stress that leads to degeneration. While lumbar disc herniation is usually caused by incorrect lifting technique i.e twisting your back while lifting something off the floor.

Why Does Structural Chiropractic Work So Well For Disc Herniations?

Structural chiropractic helps with disc herniations as looks at stabilizing the spine. This is especially effective for disc herniations as herniations are often caused by spinal instability. By creating proper motion in the spine, the surrounding muscles around the spine strengthen. This results in the spine being properly stabilized thus allowing healing to happen as much as possible rather than being repetitively stress.

So How Does This All Happen?

When your joints (any joint) are misaligned, they cannot move correctly. When a joint does not move correctly, the stabilising muscles that support that joint become lazy and weak and the nerve connection to those muscles diminishes as it’s not getting used much. It’s use it or lose it for the body, brain, and nerve connections and Just like having a cast on your arm or leg, without moving the joints for just 1-2 months, you will see a huge reduction of muscle tone and strength and nerve connectivity. More specific to the spine, without proper movement of the joints and strength of the muscles and ligaments of the spine, the spinal curves lose their most functional shape and instead of acting like springs to distribute everyday forces, all the forces go onto the bones and discs of the spine and cause degeneration, damage/injury and other dysfunctions to occur. The deep stabilising muscles and their strength and activity are important as when they are not supporting a joint properly a whole host of problems can arise. These muscles keep the joints in their proper position… so when they are weak:

Sciatica is when the sciatic nerve is being irritated. This nerve starts from the low back and runs through the hips and buttocks and down each leg. The irritation of the sciatic nerve can often lead to pain, numbness or tingling down the affected leg. In severe cases it may even lead to weakness.

What Can Cause Leg Pain, Numbness Or Tingling?

Sciatica is often caused by irritation of the sciatic nerve. This can be caused by disc herniations, bone spurs from degeneration and spinal stenosis (narrowing of the vertebral and intervertebral foramen).

Why Does Chiropractic Work So Well For Leg Pain, Numbness Or Tingling That Is Coming From Sciatica?

Chiropractic works very well for sciatica because it looks into correcting the cause of all this. By restoring optimal structure and function of the spine it allows the spine to support itself better through strengthening the deep spinal muscles. By doing so the spine is stronger and can support itself better thus allowing optimal space for the nerves to run through the foramens.

So How Does This All Happen?

When your joints (any joint) are misaligned, they cannot move correctly. When a joint does not move correctly, the stabilising muscles that support that joint become lazy and weak and the nerve connection to those muscles diminish as it’s not getting used much. It’s use it or lose it for the body, brain and nerve connections and just like having a cast on your arm or leg, without moving the joints for just 1-2 months you will see a huge reduction of muscle tone and strength and nerve connectivity. More specific to the spine, without proper movement of the joints and strength of the muscles and ligaments of the spine, the spinal curves lose their most functional shape and instead of acting like springs to distribute everyday forces, all the forces go onto the bones and discs of the spine and cause degeneration, damage/injury and other dysfunctions to occur. The deep stabilising muscles and their strength and activity are important as when they are not supporting a joint properly a whole host of problems can arise. These muscles keep the joints in their proper position… so when they are weak: