For many, seeing and hearing ocean waves is calming. For Vancouver neck pain and back pain patients, experiencing the wave of relief from pain can be the same if they understand it. For those who don’t understand that pain will come and go while healing, the wave of healing can be frustrating. Vancouver Disc Centers helps our patients understand the wave of healing, know the research supporting our relieving treatment plan, and celebrate the pain relief they experience.
DESCRIBING AND RATING PAIN
Since back and neck pain experiences are complete with fluctuations of symptoms as they get better, researchers tried to come up with a method to classify neck pain patients and their pain patterns by tracking 1208 neck pain patients. They came up with 16 subgroups! Wow. The biggest subgroup was “mild persistent fluctuating” with 25% of the patients in it rating their pain as a 3.4 out of 10 (10 worst pain). The “moderate episodic” group had 24% reporting pain at a 2.7. “Persistent fluctuating” pain patients were those bothered more by pain than the others. (1) Instead of just describing and rating pain, researchers had patients portray their pain using a visual picture scale about their pain intensity and symptomatology over a year. The patient responses were very similar in explaining the pain intensity but not so much for the symptoms and their characteristics. (2) Vancouver Disc Centers notices that everybody senses pain in slightly different ways and that they find certain sorts of pain more annoying than others do. All of our Vancouver chiropractic patients are distinctive!
THE HEALING “WAVE”
For a year, another study followed 1124 neck pain patients seeing a chiropractor. Neck pain patients having “persistent pain” – 75% to 63% over 12 months - and very minor pain remained relatively stable. Those who had “episodic pain” – 21% to 24% over the year – had greater changes in their pain patterns. (3) This is the reason we tell our back and neck pain patients that recovery is more wavelike than a straight line. While healing, pain comes and goes. Going away more than it comes is a solid sign of healing and pain relief. Vancouver Disc Centers reminds our Vancouver neck pain and back pain patients to not be discouraged along the way. We’ll get there together!
CHIROPRACTIC IN MANAGING BACK AND NECK PAIN PATTERNS
Research such as described here regarding the patterns of neck pain and back pain sufferers shows the on-going need for them to have team members like their chiropractors as well as general practitioners to handle it, understand it, and care for it. One researcher described how a patient who had spinal surgery 30 years ago now experienced neck pain and cervical arm pain due to adjacent segment disease – a condition often seen in spinal discs around the spinal level that underwent back surgery - was treated with cervical manipulation, flexion distraction decompression (Cox®), soft-tissue mobilization, and therapeutic ultrasound for pain relief. (4) Again, pain relief is rarely sudden, but rather slow and steady with treatment, coming/going pain intensity, patience, and appreciation for the relief gotten be it 50%, 70% or 90% as supported by the 50% Rule of Cox® Technic.
CONTACT Vancouver Disc Centers
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. John Murray on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he presents patient cases that were difficultcomplex and yet attained relief with The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management over time.
Schedule your Vancouver chiropractic appointment today. Together, we will aim for the calming wave of healing and celebrate the pain relief.
