Moriarty Chiropractic Offers Relieving Care for Post-Surgical Neck Pain

Neck pain anytime is not welcome. Neck pain after neck surgery is especially unwelcome…by the patient and the treating physician! Gentle manual treatment of post-surgical neck pain and any adjacent-to-the-surgical-level-segment spinal pain issues at Moriarty Chiropractic helps many Nashua neck pain sufferers find neck pain relief.

DDD

Degenerative disc disease (DDD) - the deterioration of a or multiple spinal discs – shows itself as low back pain and neck and arm pain. 40% of people over 40 years old have degenerative disc disease while 80% of those over age 80 have it. 10% to 20% of people with lumbar disc degeneration and up to 30% of those with cervical disc degeneration will not respond to non-surgical treatments. (1) Degenerative disc disease is documented as starting in the second decade of life. (2) The artificial disc replacement has existed for a while. An early analysis of its use and efficacy indicated that about 5% of DDD patients were appropriate for it. Further, the review stated that lumbar artificial disc replacement was 79% better than lumbar spine fusion with a major complication rate of 0% to 13% per implanted device. The rate of major complications at 2 years post-surgery varied from 0% to 8.1% per implant. Adjacent segment disease was stated to be 2% in an 11-year-follow-up study, but not conclusive in the clinical trial data. (1) Moriarty Chiropractic finds that post-surgical neck pain patients with such adjacent segment disease pursue our Nashua chiropractic care not uncommonly.

ADJACENT SEGMENT DISEASE AFTER CERVICAL SPINE SURGERY

Spine literature has recently addressed the concern expressed in the study above about adjacent segment disease, degenerative changes at spinal segments immediately next to a spinal fusion or disc implant area. The cause for such pain is described as potentially resulting from altered stresses on the adjacent levels after such procedures. In an article geared toward primary care practitioners who care for post-surgical patients with spinal pain, one such patient who presently had neck pain and cervical arm pain radiculopathy with a history of experiencing anterior cervical disectomy and spinal fusion surgery 30 years earlier for DDD. This patient had 34 sessions of chiropractic care – a mix of cervical manipulation, flexion distraction decompression, soft-tissue mobilization and therapeutic ultrasound – stated that they experienced relief. (3) Moriarty Chiropractic uses flexion distraction decompression procedures to gently treat post-surgical Nashua neck pain.

POST-CERVICAL SPINE SURGERY NECK PAIN

Researchers wrote that cervical spine surgeries for degenerative cervical spine conditions are rising quickly and creating post-surgical pain syndromes: chronic pain, adjacent segment disease, recurrent disc herniation, facet join pain, and/or epidural scarring. Repeat surgeries may be proposed though some patients are not able to or don’t want to undergo another surgery. Such patients may then turn to manual therapy for desired relief. Due to the fact that the clinical practice guidelines are composed but not very distinctly for post-cervical spine surgery management, researchers reviewed published papers to establish a path of care. Of 12 articles, 10 studies on conservative care recounted favorable clinical outcomes. (4) That is hopeful! Moriarty Chiropractic shares this hope with our Nashua neck pain patients who have undergone cervical spine surgery for degenerative disease and other issues causing neck pain. Our gentle spinal manipulation approach called Cox® Technic provides relieving, doctor-monitored treatment of your cervical spine.

CONTACT Moriarty Chiropractic

Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. Chris Osterlitz on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he describes how he treated a patient who found relief of his neck pain after a cervical spine surgery using the Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management which may include nutritional advice to slow the degenerative disc disease.

Make your Nashua chiropractic appointment today. Unwelcomed neck pain due to degenerative disc disease and/or adjacent segment disease after a cervical spine surgery may well find the hoped for relief in your chiropractor’s hands.