For many, ocean waves are calming. For Minster neck pain and back pain patients, feeling the wave of healing pain relief can be the same if they understand it. For those who do not understand that pain will come and go while healing, the wave of healing can be saddening. Minster Chiropractic Center helps our patients understand the wave of healing, know the research supporting our relieving treatment plan, and celebrate the pain relief they get.
DESCRIBING AND RATING PAIN
Since back and neck pain experiences are filled with fluctuations of symptoms as they heal, researchers tried to come up with a way to classify neck pain patients and their pain patterns by tracking 1208 neck pain patients. They came up with 16 subgroups! Wow. The biggest subgroup was “mild persistent fluctuating” with 25% of the patients in it reporting pain as a 3.4 out of 10 (0 no pain). The “moderate episodic” group had 24% reporting pain at a 2.7. “Persistent fluctuating” pain patients were those disturbed more by pain than the others. (1) Instead of just labeling and rating pain, researchers had patients describe their pain using a visual picture scale about their pain intensity and symptomatology over 12 months. The patient responses were quite similar in defining the pain intensity but not so much for the symptoms and their characteristics. (2) Minster Chiropractic Center observes that everybody feels pain in slightly different ways and that they find certain sorts of pain more annoying than others do. All of our Minster chiropractic patients are distinctive!
THE HEALING “WAVE”
For 12 months, another study followed 1124 neck pain patients who saw a chiropractor. Neck pain patients having “persistent pain” – 75% to 63% over the year - and very minor pain stayed relatively stable. Those who had “episodic pain” – 21% to 24% over the year – had greater changes in their pain patterns. (3) This is why we tell our back and neck pain patients that recovery is more wavelike than a straight line. While healing, pain comes and goes. Going away more than it comes is a positive sign of healing and pain relief. Minster Chiropractic Center reminds our Minster neck pain and back pain patients to not be discouraged along the way. We’ll get there together!
CHIROPRACTIC IN MANAGING BACK AND NECK PAIN PATTERNS
Research such as explained here about the patterns of neck pain and back pain sufferers shows the on-going need for them to have partners like their chiropractors as well as general practitioners to handle it, understand it, and care for it. A researcher explained how a patient who had spinal surgery 30 years ago now experienced neck pain and cervical arm pain due to adjacent segment disease – a condition often seen in spinal discs around the spinal level that underwent back surgery - was treated with cervical manipulation, flexion distraction decompression (Cox®), soft-tissue mobilization, and therapeutic ultrasound for pain relief. (4) Again, pain relief is seldom sudden, but rather systematic with treatment, coming/going pain intensity, patience, and appreciation for the relief attained be it 50%, 70% or 90% as explained by the 50% Rule of Cox® Technic.
CONTACT Minster Chiropractic Center
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. John Murray on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he shares patient cases that were complicated and yet found relief with The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management with time.
Make your Minster chiropractic appointment today. Together, we will aim for the calming wave of healing and celebrate the pain relief.
