Food for Thought

Back Pain – Neck Pain – Spinal Related Disorders.

Back pain. If you are an adult you will  probably have had back pain, will get back pain – or are in pain right now. That is why you are on this site.

Indeed 80 to 90% of the adult population gets back, neck or spinal pains. But is back pain a shortage of Nurofen or Voltaren?

Obviously not. Then why do we treat it that way?

If spinal pain is the warning light that something is wrong, why do we go for years with the warning light flashing at us? We certainly would not do that to our car.

If the spine is the most important organ we possess (we can’t live without it), and so many are debilitated by their spinal pain and the impact it has on the nervous system – why isn’t the spine treated with the respect it deserves?

For the average GP, spinal pain is considered ‘self limiting’ and merely a shortage of anti-inflammatory or muscle relaxants.

If you have pain for too long then you must have ‘arthritis’, ‘chronic pain syndrome’, ‘fibromyalgia’, ‘poly-rheumatica’ or ‘poly-myalgia’. Which is generally code for ‘I am not sure what is really causing your pain – but here are some drugs anyway’.

If X-rays are taken, they are usually done lying down. But last time we checked you don’t walk around lying down. Certainly no functional loading X-rays are ordered and no biomechanical assessment is performed.

When was the last time your GP (or Chiro) took some measurements on your X-rays?

Was the curve of your neck or lower back measured?  It is the equivalent of taking a blood sample, looking at it and saying ‘yes, it is red, it looks normal – there is nothing wrong’. You would never have a blood sample taken without detailed analysis of red blood cells, white blood cells or platelet levels etc.

If you have been seeing a Chiropractor or Osteopath, where are the follow up X-rays to measure the success of their care? Why are they cagey or resist having a second set of X-rays to fully asses the corrective changes? Most likely because there are none.

We now have chiropractors, osteopaths and manipulative physiotherapists endlessly ‘cracking the sore bits’. Others just ‘crack and hope’ without an adequate diagnosis and usually without X-rays or MRI.

Physiotherapists are telling patients if they just do some exercises every thing will be OK. Usually the ‘diagnosis’ is what the GP tells the physiotherapist to do based on incorrect X-rays (done lying down) and an incomplete biomechanical, neurological, nutritional and functional analysis.

The point is, that if it just came down to a few exercises, then no athlete would ever get back pain. But they do.

Much of the ‘health care’ (sickness management) industry is focused on treating symptoms rather than investigating underlying causes and the effect of posture, structure, spinal function and diet on disease.

Perhaps it is time for you to have thorough, scientific analysis of your Spine, Posture and Neuro-Musculoskeletal system as the first step to better health? You are in the right place.