Know Your Back ( SPINE )

Its been now about 11 years in profession to treat back related problems. During the time I have been to various countries. There have been totally different experiences during my professional journey so far. It has been an experience to know and learn from a patient's psychology and perspective. One common thing that i find across the patient population suffering from back related problems. Most of us do not know much about back problem. Except a few words like "sciatica" "slip disc" etc. the biggest myth prevailing when a patient is offered a surgery for a back problem is "spine surgery can not be done". A patient who can not walk or stand or even sit easily without pain do not want to accept the option of spine surgery thinking that the only outcome of a spine surgery is paralysis or because spine surgery is never successful. let me try to give a surgeon's scientific views on this. Q:1  Is a spine surgery never successful ? Its a k

Myths about Back Pain Back pain is one of the commonest causes that lead us to doctors’ out patient clinic. Three out of four adult will experience back pain during their lifetime. The intensity of pain may vary with person to person. Most acute episodes of back pain are quite benign and self limiting, however, chronic back pain are quite disabling physically, psychologically as well as economically! Lower back pain is commonest amongst various pain patterns affecting human back. Back pain can occur in all age groups from pediatric to geriatric. The most surprising fact remains that our knowledge and awareness about probably one of most disabling disease is very shallow. Low back, per se, is a non-life threatening condition unlike heart disease but it can make a life miserable. Although awareness about back pain is lacking, we doctors consider back pain mostly either a condition associated with faulty life style or a disease related to age- wear & tear. W

Osteoporosis , a disease in which our bone's internal architecture is damaged so much so that bones becomes internally weak. Such bone can crumple under very trivial loadings and lead to insufficiency fractures. The effect of osteoporosis is most pronounced into the human spine because of its axial position and due to the internal structure of it's vertebrae. Mostly a disease of elderly. This fractures can be silent. Meaning some vertebral fractures are without symptoms. We recognize such fractures only when we take an X-ray for some other reasons or when we notice bent (stooped) posture of the patient. However, most are significantly symptomatic. Patients comes with history of very trivial fall, like missing a step, getting up from the ground, lifting a bucket of water etc.. following which the patient is in back pain. Pain is mostly continuous or occurs while loading conditions (standing, getting up from bed, walking, twisting, turning in bed etc). Most patients do ver

To optimize your chances of keeping back pain at bay, there are a variety of preventive measures you can take: First, maintain a reasonable activity level and — under your doctor's supervision — incorporate exercises that gently stretch and strengthen your back and abdominal muscles. "Keep moving!" advises Dr. Peters. "The ability and motivation to remain active is very important during this time." If you spend your days behind a desk, take advantage of opportunities to get up and stretch your legs — and back — while getting your work done. "Don't stay at your desk," Dr. Peters says. "Early in your pregnancy, discuss with your employer the ways in which you might be able to use a little more autonomy in how you carry out your job, if at all possible." Maintaining good posture as your body changes is also important. As your center of gravity shifts forward, minimize the strain on your lower back by standing as straight as possible,

http://www.spineuniverse.com/wellness/exercise/5-back-pain-stretches-exercises-video please go through this video if you want a strong back !

A very strange mode of injury i saw recently. It happened so that a young boy , who used to work at a zoo as a cage cleaner. He one day while cleaning the cage of an Asiatic Lion forgot to close the divider door. The Lion punched him with a violent paw and look what the lion did to a human spine.... The image shows complete dislocation with a violent separation of vertebral column. Its a very mutilating injury. Looking to the image only one can say that spinal cord will be completely crushed and torn ( a transected spinal cord ). Patient has no control of lower limb with no control of bowel or bladder. Patient has no chance of recovery in such kind of injury to spinal cord with whatever doctors do. But we need to operate upon such patient so that we can allow early rehabilitation of the patient with wheelchair training. We operated upon the patient. Believe me , its a very very very tough job to reduce such kind of dislocation. But , reduction was complete post surgery. see the