Chronic Back Pain - How To Handle It?

Chronic back pain is one of the common problems faced by people of all ages. This leads to disability to move. Fortunately, there are a wide variety of options to treat this condition.

Common Causes:
Chronic back pain can happen due to ligament strain or muscle pull due to heavy lifting. Bulging of the disk can also result in chronic pain. Apart from this, there are other reasons such as skeletal irregularities, osteoporosis, arthritis etc.

Treatment options:
Depending on the level of pain, a doctor might suggest one of the many treatment options available. Chronic pain can be managed with home treatment as well. It is advisable to continue with the daily activities such as walking, running etc. If the pain persists, a doctor might suggest one of the following methods:

1. Over the counter medicine: For chronic pain, a doctor might suggest over the counter medicine such as naproxen sodium, ibuprofen, etc. However, over usage of these medicines has devastating side effects.
2. Narcotics: Drugs such as hydrocodone and codeine can be used under the supervision of a doctor to get relief from back pain.
3. Tropical relievers: These are creams or ointments that can give instant relief from chronic pain.
4. Antidepressants: It has been identified by many medical practitioners that usage of certain anti-depressants can relieve a person from chronic back pain.
5. Injections: If all else fails, as the last avenue, a medical practitioner can inject cortisone around the spinal cord area to cut down nerve root inflammation. The effect, however, lasts less than a month.

Therapy and exercise:
Therapy is one of the best ways to counter chronic back pain. Based on the pain frequency and bearing capacity of the patient, a physiotherapist can try various treatment varieties such as ultrasound, heat, techniques related to muscles release, electrical simulation etc. A combination of these treatments can reduce chronic pain. As part of the process, the next step is that a physiotherapist ensures is to strengthen the abdominal muscle with various exercises. The latter also ensures that the pain doesn’t come back.

Alternative Medicine:
There are many alternative medicine options which are known to be extremely helpful for chronic pain management. Some of them are mentioned below:

1. Chiropractic care: This form of alternative medicine manipulates the spine to reduce the pain and give relief for the long term.
2. Massage: Massage might help in those cases where the trigger of the pain is due to over work.
3. Acupuncture: An acupuncture specialist injects sterilized steel inside the skin at nodal points. Many patients have reported that few sittings with a specialist have improved the chronic pain.
4. Yoga: It is a form of exercise that is a combination of breathing technique and posture maintenance that can greatly help in chronic pain management.