If you had back pain, which one of the following would you seek help from?

[Finch]

Out of interest do you have private health cover? Because I am sure NHS will not send you for imaging straight away?

I'm not from England, so I don't know the ins and outs of your referral system. Yes is the answer though, although I'm not sure if it covers imaging. I'm only interested in covering the big costs. If you have restrictions on getting imaging then it does introduce complexity. I was reading about MRI costs around the world the other day and they range from around US 200-1200 (I have a feeling the 200 was in France but my memory on it is hazy).

 

[knocky1]

Few points to make. The first is that the NHS has ridiculous waiting times.

Secondly for 3 years from 1988-91 I was almost unable to move from swollen joints (not those but they did help medicinally). My GP said I was overdoing things and that was all. I went to an osteopath who said I had two hernias and something seriously wrong and that I had to go back to the GP. He was not impressed with being told this and said I may have one hernia and took a blood test. The outcome was trips to Guys Hospital to be told I had 2 hernias and sero negative ankylosing spondyltis. Thanks osteopath. The hernias probably triggered the rheumatoid artritis. Luckily over the years it has left my body but apparently that was a 50/50 chance. Wake up NHS.

 

[Titus]

With respect I'm not sure some people on this thread really know what bad back trouble is. When it takes you 15 minutes to get out of bed and another 15 to get downstairs then you have back trouble. When you can't even change your socks without help then you have back trouble. I was like that for a few months last year.

 

[knocky1]

With respect I'm not sure some people on this thread really know what bad back trouble is. When it takes you 15 minutes to get out of bed and another 15 to get downstairs then you have back trouble. When you can't even change your socks without help then you have back trouble. I was like that for a few months last year.

With respect the pain is relative to the person with a bad back. To say someone else has worse pain does not help. My ankylosing spondylitis produced iritis. This is where the iris swells within the eyeball. Whilst receiving treatment and moaning about the pain the nurse pointed out that a lot of people they see lose, or have lost, their sight and how lucky I was. My thought was how much pain I was in.

 

[Surf's Up]

This is always a heated topic and some of the practitioners who aren't wholly based in science have governing bodies who are very quick to sue people over debate. I will say there are competent people in all fields, but you have no way of knowing this without inside knowledge so your GP should be your first port of call. Some GP's have musculoskeletal backgrounds and special interests, some are not as well versed but they are the most likely to initiate getting a diagnosis for you and referring you to someone appropriate.

Getting a diagnosis is what you should be concerned about. You should not be jumping into heavy manipulation without knowing what is causing your pain. Easier said than done in some cases however but just trying to treat symptoms and not the root cause often makes people feel good about the treatment but does bugger all to actually help them long term. I see too many people with structural damage to their spine who have had ****ing hundreds of physio / chiro / osteo treatments before they even had some imaging done.

If I was to hurt my back today my GP would refer me to a GPSI / musculoskeletal specialist who would perform a clinical examination and get imaging done if it was warranted. This is the ideal scenario as we can pick up so many conditions this way, protrusions / extrusions, and the various bony changes that happen to narrow the spaces the spinal cord / nerve roots go through can be detected.

Now you know what the cause of your issue is, this is where you can choose your treatment. A surgeon will offer you surgical and non-surgical options, but they tend to sell you the idea they can solve most problems surgically. You might have an annular tear and a protrusion abutting a nerve and its painful as hell so surgery sounds like a bloody great idea when its offered to you, but they also generally resolve over time, its just really uncomfortable. This is why being diagnosed by a GPSI / musculoskeletal specialist is ideal as they have nothing to gain from your choice of treatment. Assessing the stability of the discs around the problem area gives you the knowledge of if surgery is a necessity or an option. You then have the power to make informed decisions of how you want to manage your pain and taking some pain medication and seeing the physios etc for some manipulation (if appropriate) now is a viable option.

This is the right approach - you have to get a proper diagnosis of the problem before deciding on the appropriate treatment - my main criticism of osteopaths and chiropractors is that they will take your money and manipulate your back without a proper diagnosis, I'm sorry, it's true. They should refuse to treat unless the patient has got their X Ray/MRI results but they don't because the ££££ s is too easy.

 

[Barrel of Fun]

My old man's GP told him to go away and see a physio. The physio decided he had an exploded disc and he had an emergency operation to rectify the situation.