Effective Back Pain Treatment

We see many patients with back pain in our Pikesville & Baltimore, MD office, and Dr. Robert Stein & Dr. Brian Lerman has been able to help a lot of them get relief through various chiropractic techniques. However, dealing with back pain doesn't necessarily mean having to decide between chiropractic care and medical care, as many people utilize both types of care with great success.

Study Confirms Chiropractic and Medical Treatment Work Well Together

In a report published by the journal Spine investigators¹ looked at a group of active-duty military personnel between the ages of 18 and 35 who claimed both acute pain and restricted function due to back-related issues. Some of the study participants received treatment via standard medical therapy, while the rest were given chiropractic care as well as regular medical care, as the authors wanted to determine which patients fared better.

The authors observed that the group that got standard medical care in combination with chiropractic care scored "significantly better" than the group that got medical care alone; 73 percent reported positive benefits compared to just 17% of the medical treatment only group who reported the same amount of improvement. This was true regarding both pain and level of function at the two- and four-week marks.

Therefore, integrating these two forms of treatment can greatly benefit you--the patient--offering advantages when compared to medical care alone. However, while chiropractic care and medical approaches can work together, chiropractic offers some distinct strengths over medical therapy.

Where Chiropractic Care Wins

Although it might seem as if each approach plays a 50-50 role, there is one significant advantage that chiropractic care has over medical treatment and that is in patient satisfaction. In fact, a piece of research done at 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 those undergoing medical treatment.

According to the experts, the main aspects that patients favored over medical care were "self-care advice and explanation of treatment." This isn't unexpected, as chiropractors frequently spend much more time advising their patients as to how they can improve their health on their own, as well as discussing more thoroughly what to expect from chiropractic care.

Chiropractic Is a Natural Approach to Wellness

Certainly, the methods associated with chiropractic are very different than those available with medical treatment, but a large amount of the difference is the fact that chiropractic is a natural approach to health and well-being. Instead of focusing on just relieving the symptoms, chiropractic care involves finding the root cause of your pain, which often means greater improvement as you are addressing the problem at its source.

In addition, while medication is sometimes helpful for managing certain conditions, many health issues respond well to a natural approach like chiropractic. This means fewer negative side effects from drugs and lasting results.

You don't have to endure back pain or other health issues. Give our Pikesville & Baltimore, MD office a call today at (410) 581-9966. 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.