Effective Back Pain Treatment

We see many people with back pain in our Henderson office, and Dr. Russell has been able to help a lot of them get relief with chiropractic care. At the same time, recovering from back problems doesn't necessarily mean having to make a choice between chiropractic care and medical treatment, as many people use both types of care with great success.

Research Confirms Chiropractic and Medical Treatment Work Well Together

In a study published by the journal Spine researchers¹ looked at a group of active-duty military personnel between the ages of 18 and 35 who reported both acute discomfort and limited function due to back-related issues. Some of the study participants engaged in treatment via standard medical care, while the remainder received chiropractic care in addition to regular medical care, as researchers wanted to see which group fared better.

The authors discovered that the patients who got standard medical care along with chiropractic care scored "significantly better" than the group that got medical care alone; 73 percent reported positive benefits in comparison to just 17% of the medical care only group who indicated the same amount of improvement. This was true regarding both pain and level of function at two and four weeks.

Thus, combining these two forms of treatment can greatly benefit you--the patient--offering benefits when compared to medical care alone. However, while chiropractic care and medical approaches can work alongside each other, chiropractic offers some unique strengths over medical treatment.

Where Chiropractic Care Is Successful

Although it might seem as if each approach plays a 50/50 role, there is one major benefit that chiropractic care has over medical treatment and that is in patient satisfaction. In fact, one bit of research from UCLA² that was published in the American Journal of Public Health reports that, on average, chiropractic patients are generally more satisfied with their recovery than people undergoing medical care.

According to the researchers, the main factors that patients preferred over medical care were "self-care advice and explanation of treatment." This isn't unexpected, as chiropractors tend to spend much more time advising their patients as to how they can better their health on their own, as well as outlining more thoroughly what to expect from chiropractic.

Chiropractic Offers a Non-Invasive Approach

Certainly, the strategies associated with chiropractic are quite different than those available with medical care, but a large amount of the distinction is the fact that chiropractic is a holistic approach to health and well-being. Rather than focusing on simply relieving the symptoms, chiropractic care involves searching for the primary cause of your pain, which often translates to greater improvement as you are tackling the problem at its source.

Furthermore, while medication is sometimes helpful for treating certain conditions, many health issues respond well to a natural approach like chiropractic care. This means fewer negative side effects from prescriptions and lasting results.

You don't have to suffer from back pain or other health issues. Give our Henderson office a call today at (702) 990-2225. We'll do everything we can to help you get and stay free from back pain.

References

1. Goertz CM, Long CR, Hondras MA, Petri R, Delgado R, Lawrence DJ, Owens EF, Meeker WC. Adding chiropractic manipulative therapy to standard medical care for patients with acute low back pain: results of a pragmatic randomized comparative effectiveness study. Spine 2013;38(8):627-634.
2. Hertzman-Miller RP1, Morgenstern H, Hurwitz EL, Yu F, Adams AH, Harber P, Kominski GF. Comparing the satisfaction of low back pain patients randomized to receive medical or chiropractic care: results from the UCLA low-back pain study. American Journal of Public Health 2002;92(10):1628-1633.