Low Back Pain
Low back pain is a common condition characterized by discomfort or stiffness in the lower spine area, often affecting daily activities. It can arise from various causes, including muscle strain, injury, or underlying medical conditions.
Subscribe to the BlogPain After Back Surgery: Tracy’s Story
Can we help failed back surgery patients? That’s one of the most common questions I get from patients with chronic back pain. The answer is often “yes” and today I’ll cover Tracy’s journey with the DDD procedure. Let’s dig in. Failed Low Back Syndrome One of my favorite movie quotes of all time comes from…read more
Do You Have Back Pain When Getting Up from a Chair?
Back pain when getting up from a chair is a big problem that’s rarely talked about. In fact, I hear my patients with back pain complain about this issue many times a month. What’s up? Let’s dig in. Back Pain when Getting Up from a Chair When someone with low back pain has trouble getting…read more
Microgravity and the Most Important Low Back Muscle Called Multifidus
The multifidus is one of those key muscles that you NEED to know about if you have back pain, but you likely have never heard about it. Let’s learn about this muscle, but also look at what happens to it if we remove the earth’s gravity. Let’s dig in. What is the Multifidus? Multifidus is…read more
The Healthy Discs in Your Low Back Are Full of Bacteria?
Every so often you come across a scientific article that so challenges what doctors think they know that it blows your mind. That just happened today when I ran across an article that showed that our low back discs are filled with bacteria just like the microbiome in our guts! The mind-blower? Physicians are taught…read more Lumbar Stenosis Treatment Without Surgery
One of the more amazing changes in our spine practice over the last several years has been on how we look at lumbar stenosis. I’ve gone from referring almost all of these patients to surgery to referring very few. Why? We reimagined what was going on with these patients. Lumbar stenosis treatment without surgery is…read more ITB Lower Back Pain: Why Your Back Makes Your ITB Hurt
About two-thirds of the back pain patients on whom I perform an exam have a fired-up and tender ITB. In addition, I’ve seen through the years that treating the issues in the back as well as the ITB works much better than just treating the back. Why? Because the ITB is the canary in the…read more CCJ Instability: Patients Don’t Know What Their Doctors Don’t Tell Them
If you read this blog, you know that I often write about what I see every day in practice and usually about those things that, as my mother used to say, “get me going.” This week I evaluated a young woman with CCJ instability who didn’t know before getting her neck fused and nerves surgically…read more Leg Muscle Wasting as You Age? Check Your Low Back Nerves
Have you ever noticed that thinner older people have flatter butts and skinnier legs compared to young people? According to new research, this isn’t just your imagination, but a real physiologic effect of aging. One that again shows us how much the nerve supply of the low back impacts our legs without us knowing it’s…read more 
