Chiropractic Care treats
West Palm Beach neck pain patients with cervical spine disc
herniations that trigger arm pain radiculopathy. Non-surgical care
of arm pain radiculopathy helps West Palm Beach neck pain and arm pain sufferers experience
some relief without surgery.
CERVICAL RADICULOPATHY
In setting up a treatment plan for for
cervical spine-related arm pain (aka cervical
radiculopathy), research guidelines state conservative
management as a first-line treatment option over surgery.
Clinically, cervical radiculopathy can present as numbness, paresthesia, motor
change, reflex change and/or sensory change. Researchers have been working
to establish guidelines for its non-surgical management and treatment
at various stages of pain including acute, subacute, and
chronic. (1) Chiropractic Care uses such guidelines in planning non-surgical treatment
for our West Palm Beach chiropractic patients.
GUIDELINES FOR TREATING CERVICAL DISC HERNIATIONS
In writing the non-surgical
guidelines, researchers explained the risk-benefit ratio for
surgical treatment of cervical radiculopathy as less favorable
than for non-surgical, conservative care. In looking at
care of cervical radiculopathy through its stages, the
non-surgical interventions’ guidelines shift from more passive care in the acute phase to more active, individualized, self-managed
care in the chronic phase. Particularly, for the acute
stage, multimodal management including spinal manipulation, patient
education, exercise, and positioning that eases the
pain were helpful. For subacute cervical
radiculopathy, enhanced specific exercises, supervised motor
control motions and/or mobilization may be added. In the
chronic phase, patients may benefit from general aerobic exercise
and strength training, postural instruction, and ergonomic assessment of
job-related activities, general aerobic exercise and
strength training, postural instruction, and ergonomic assessment of
job-related activities may be added}29}. (2) We understand
that our neck and arm pain patients appreciate activities
like this that get them back to doing what
they want to do.
TIME AND THE CERVICAL DISC HERNIATION
Overall, in one systematic review study, 56.4%
of degenerative cervical radiculopathy patients - 39.1% of conservatively
treated patients and 60.5% of surgically treated patients – described motor deficits before treatment. (3) A
spine surgeon described a case report of a patient who
was ready to undergo cervical spine discectomy/fusion surgery
for a C4-C5 disc herniation whose
disc resorbed on a confirming repeat MRI, making surgery needless.
The researcher acknowledged that more research was available
on the decrease
of lumbar disc herniations seen on MRI by 34.7% to 95% over 6 to 17 months
and total resolution of the disc in 43% to 75% yet postulated
that cervical disc herniations were likely to act the same way. (4) Like the author,
Chiropractic Care holds out hope for our cervical disc herniation and cervical
radiculopathy patients that surgery may not be required. Our
conservative West Palm Beach chiropractic treatment may
well help in relieving the symptoms and pain.
CONTACT Chiropractic Care
Listen to this PODCAST
with Dr. Umar Ellahie on The
Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he
describes cervical radiculopathy and its relieving care with
The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management.
Make your West Palm Beach chiropractic
appointment soon. Cervical radiculopathy and cervical disc
herniation sufferers have a pain-relieving partner at our
clinic.