What Is Sciatica (Sciatic Nerve Pain)?

Sciatica Resource Report – Including the #1 Secret to Solving Your Chronic Sciatica Pain (with real patient pictures)

A Word from the Doctor: Thank you for downloading this sciatica resource from the Life In Alignment website. It was written by me, Dr. Zachary Ward, to help explain why sciatica nerve pain can be a frustrating problem to solve. Even if you are receiving the best care from expert providers, a piece of the puzzle may be missing to help you find the relief that you so desperately need. In the image above is a patient who came to Life In Alignment, after receiving regular chiropractic care. His doctor was a competent chiropractor, but he couldn't find lasting relief until I was able to correct his spine – using a different method than most chiropractic patients experience. After putting a little pressure behind his ear, just enough to correct an important area of the neck – much of his sciatica pain disappeared in a few short weeks – offering him the lasting change he wanted. He was so happy with this change that he posted this testimonial to our practice Facebook page. I copied it and pasted it here for you to read. So, how are these changes possible and why haven't you heard about this solution?

• Learn what sciatica is, what the symptoms of sciatica are, and why sciatica is a bit tricky for you to deal with.

• Learn about your 10 most common treatment options from both medicine and physical therapy.

• Learn the unique spine secret behind sciatic nerve pain relief with pictures that will reveal the whole body cause of your sciatica nerve pain.

What is sciatica (sciatic nerve pain)?

Sciatica is: • one of the most common health complaints of the lower back and leg,

• one of the most common kinds of nerve pain in the body,

• and it can be one of the most difficult conditions to resolve without proper chiropractic care.

Sciatica is nerve pain that follows the path of your sciatic nerve. Its technical definition is “inflammation of the sciatic.”

The sciatic nerve is the nerve that supplies nervous system energy to the muscles and skin of your lower leg.

With this kind of nerve pain, you may feel the pain anywhere along the path of the sciatic nerve. You may have pain in the lower back, buttocks, lower leg and/or foot.

You do have a sciatic nerve on both the right and left side of the body. But sciatica usually occurs on only one side at one time.

This is perhaps the hardest thing to understand about sciatica symptoms:

Sciatica itself is not a medical condition–it describes a set of symptoms that are caused by another health condition. So sciatica is never a cause of anything. It is just the result of something.

Any condition that puts extra pressure on the sciatic nerve or the roots of the sciatic nerve can cause the symptoms of sciatica. And this is why it’s so tricky.

For example, a bulging disc or a extremely tight piriformis muscle (a muscle of the buttocks) can both cause sciatica.

Where is the sciatic nerve?

The sciatic nerve is the largest nerve in your body. The sciatic nerve emerges from the spinal cord in the lower back. It travels through the pelvis and then runs through thigh muscles on the back of the leg.

Around the back of your knee it splits into two—and one half travels down the back of the leg into the foot. The others travel down the front and side of the leg into the foot.

The sciatic nerve supplies sensation (feeling) to the skin of most of the lower leg and the foot.

It also controls your leg and foot muscles. If you pick up your leg and look at your toes right now, you are using your sciatic nerve to do that.

What are the the most common sciatica symptoms?

These symptoms usually occur on one side of your body. Do you have any of these sciatica symptoms?

• Buttock pain • Low back pain • Calf pain • Numbness (in skin of leg and/or foot) • Pain in one part of leg, numbness in another

Copyright 2015 Dr. Zachary Ward – Auburn Hills, Michigan • Tingling, or pins and needles sensations (also called parasthesias) • Muscle weakness • Loss of muscle control • Loss of bladder or bowel control (rare–requires immediate medical attention)

Sciatica nerve pain may feel like:

• Mild ache • Dull ache • Sharp, burning sensation • Intense pain • Jolt or electric shock • Shooting pain that travels down the path of the sciatic nerve

Sciatica can be aggravated by or made worse by the following situations: • Lying in bed at night • Sneezing, coughing or laughing • Bending backward or walking • Standing or sitting for prolonged periods of time

What causes sciatica? All sciatica pain is caused by anything that puts extra pressure on the sciatic nerve or the sciatic nerve roots, up in the spine.

According to some experts the most common cause of this type of pressure is a ruptured/herniated disc in lower back.

(The disc is a pad of cartilage between your spinal bones. When it breaks down it can dry out and start to bulge near your spinal cord. However, disc bulges are relatively common. And not everyone who has a bulging disc gets sciatica pain.)

Some experts say that about 90% of cases of sciatica are caused by spinal disc herniation.

• Spinal stenosis (a narrowing of the spinal canal that puts pressure on the spinal cord, for example bone spurs are one cause of spinal stenosis)

• Piriformis syndrome (in some people the sciatic nerve runs through or under this muscle, so that muscle spasm, trauma or overuse puts pressure on the sciatic nerve)

• Pregnancy (additional weight of the fetus can put extra pressure on sciatic nerve)

• Pelvic injury or fracture

• Tumors

In some cases of sciatica symptoms, there is no identifiable underlying cause. When the doctor orders an MRI, the disc isn’t bulging (no spinal disc herniation). There is no obvious piriformis syndrome. There is no spinal stenosis.

In these situations, your doctor may have a hard time explaining why you have sciatica. In that case it might be hard to find sciatic nerve pain relief if you don’t respond to typical medications.

What are your sciatica treatment options?

Once more, sciatic nerve pain can be caused by anything putting pressure on the sciatic nerve. As you just learned, you know that pressure can happen up in the spine….Or down in the leg.

There is a good chance your sciatic nerve pain will probably be diagnosed as a disc problem. Sometimes sciatica is only considered true sciatica if a disc is actually swollen.

(Again, the disc is pad of cartilage between the spinal bones. The spinal disc between the lower spine bones will be considered ruptured or herniated. You may even get an MRI showing swelling of the disc.)

With or without disc swelling, sciatica may go away on its own. In this case your sciatica relief may take a few weeks, or even months, waiting for the swelling to decrease.

Because it is known to reduce over time, medical doctors often treat sciatica with conservative care. For many patients, sciatica pain relief means rest and pain killers, and a little bit of home care.

The following are a few things you can do to try get sciatica relief at home. (Only do any of the following after seeking the opinion of your health care provider of choice. This information isn’t for home treatment or diagnosis.)

These are the most common medical treatment recommendations you will hear for sciatica pain relief…

1. Apply ice or cold packs – applied to the painful area, several times per day for 10 to 20 minutes of time.

2. Use hot packs or heating pad – applied to the painful area, several times per day, for 10 to 20 minutes of time. Most doctors would recommend waiting a few days after a flare-up before you start with any heat.

Keep in mind, with any heat or ice, you are not actually speeding up any healing of the body. You are using heat or ice as a temporary pain control for the sciatica. It is medication free. But your pain will not go away any faster. You still have to wait for the tissue to heal.

(Some experts say to limit heat or ice to just 10 minutes at a time.)

3. Try gentle stretching for relaxation during a disc issue. Called the press up position, this places the spine in extension and may help relieve disc pressure.

4. Try gentle stretching for release of piriformis muscle. If the piriformis muscle in the buttock is really what is causing the sciatica pain, then more aggressive stretching may be helpful. There are a number of stretches for this area of the body that you could learn, like the piriformis stretch.

5. Reduce the pain with over the counter medications. Often the following pain relievers are recommended. You can buy them without a prescription: ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin) and naproxen (Aleve).

A few more points about conservative care

The general recommendation is to try to stay as active as possible. Even when you are still experiencing some pain. Although bed rest may be unavoidable at first, regular movement, stretching, and some exercise is better in the long run.

Copyright 2015 Dr. Zachary Ward – Auburn Hills, Michigan Any movements that involve twisting or bouncing should be avoided. They generally put additional stress on the lower spine. There are a number of other exercises you should avoid as well.

Doctors usually allow several weeks for the pain to improve on its own before recommending more aggressive options.

Medications for sciatic pain relief

6. If conservative care isn’t helping, your doctor may prescribe one or more of the following medications for sciatica pain: • Nonsteroidal Anti-inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDs) • Muscle relaxants • Narcotics • Tricyclic antidepressants • Anti-seizure medications

The goal of most of these medications is pain relief. They are not treating the underlying cause, just helping you manage the pain.

Be aware that all medications have potential side effects, and should only be a short term solution for sciatica pain relief.

Injections near sciatic nerve roots

7. If your pain has not improved after a reasonable trial of conservative care, your doctor may recommend local steroid injections.

This involves injecting corticosteroid medication directly into the inflamed area around the nerves of your spine.

Corticosteroids are strong anti-inflammatory drugs, so they reduce the inflammation that may be putting pressure on the sciatic nerve or nerve root.

The pain relief from a steroid injection only lasts a few months. The number and frequency of steroid injections you can receive is limited, because there are potential side effects.

In the case of sciatica that is caused by piriformis syndrome, BOTOX may be an option. Injections of botulinum toxin (BOTOX) into the piriformis muscle may help reduce pain by inhibiting muscle contraction.

Surgery is generally considered a last resort for treatment of sciatica pain. The goal of surgery is to remove whatever is putting pressure on the sciatic nerve.

Surgery is most appropriate if the sciatica pain is caused by an abscess, tumor or bone spur that is pressing on the sciatic nerve or nerve root. Or if the disc is so broken down that pieces of it are floating around the spinal cord.

8. In the case of sciatica caused by disc herniation, surgery may be necessary if you have: • extreme weakness, • loss of bowel or bladder control, • or pain that is getting worse over time even after other therapy options.

Physical Therapy

Physical therapy may be recommended at any point during your sciatic flare- up. It just depends on the experience and philosophy of the doctor. Some doctors wait for the flare-up to calm down before writing a physical therapy prescription.

9. Physical therapists have other pain control options, like electrical stimulation. Like medication, these modalities are there to relieve sciatica pain temporarily, while waiting for the swelling to go down. Unlike medication, there are few side effects.

10. Physical therapists will usually use exercise to help prevent future sciatica. Exercise will be used to • improve your posture, • strengthen the muscles that provide back support (including those abdominal “core” muscles) • and increase increase flexibility

If you count exercise and modalities like stim, then you have learned about 10 different options you may encounter looking for sciatica nerve relief.

And this doesn’t include other providers, like movement therapists, acupuncturists, or massage therapists.

Many of these things work for patients. However, many more patients will benefit and find lasting sciatica relief by correcting the alignment of the spine.

This sciatica solution may seem obvious at first...but in reality it is not. You will understand why once you see the real patient pictures below, and learn how these patients were corrected.

Judging by the number of people who contact Life In Alignment with unresolved sciatica pain, there are many, many people who haven’t yet discovered this secret to alignment, posture, and sciatic nerve pain.

Even people currently being treated for sciatica by all the popular methods mentioned in this resource.

So, here it is. The #1 secret to finding lasting sciatica pain relief: take lasting pressure off of the sciatica nerve allowing the nerve to heal.

This seems pretty obvious, but, the situation gets a little more complex when you remember what you’ve already learned:

Anything that places pressure on the sciatica nerve from the low back all the way down the leg can create sciatica symptoms.

Anything. Any inflammation of any tissue near the sciatic nerve.

That’s a lot of tissue, in a lot of places. So that’s plenty of opportunity for your sciatica nerve to go wrong and become inflamed.

So, what should you do about it?

How about a whole body correction that gets to the major sources of that chronic inflammation?

The sciatica solution explained

In order to remove pressure on the sciatica nerve, you have to remove unnecessary pressure on the tissues that can affect your sciatica nerve.

Including the tissues of:

• the ligaments and muscles of the spine

What’s the easiest way to change the structure of the spine and posture in a short amount of time?

Release the tension of the neck created by undetected misalignments.

In my chiropractic experience, both as a doctor, and as a patient with a history of spinal pain – the neck is the missing key.

Does that mean get a deep tissue massage? That might be helpful, but in this case we are talking about releasing the problem joint alignment of the neck, created by a bunch of little injuries and the body’s breakdown over time.

It is the upper cervical subluxation complex in chiropractic jargon. You don’t need to remember that. But you might want to remember these pictures.

Before and after pictures of the not-so-obvious sciatica solution

Both of these images below are of patients at Life In Alignment Chiropractic in Auburn Hills, Michigan. Both came in with classic sciatica pain symptoms.

And their posture? Can you see the way this distortion shifts to be being more balanced?

The patient in the right image experienced chronic sciatica pain in the left low back and left leg. (There was also some neck pain and mid-back pain as well.)

Both have seen either a major decrease in their symptoms or complete elimination by helping their distorted spine alignment, by first correcting the neck. Gently.

Both had seen expert medical and holistic doctors before receiving their spine correction.

This is the #1 secret for lasting sciatica pain relief for many, many people.

Release the pressure on the sciatic nerve by releasing pressure on the human frame. A problem that often starts in the neck.

While this solution is effective, it isn't so obvious. Which is why almost no one is offering this service.

If you are in the Metro Detroit area and want a second opinion on your sciatica symptoms and pain, then request a consultation via the contact form on the practice website, or simply call the office. (248) 598-4002.

A simple screening to see if your neck alignment is affecting your lower spine and sciatic nerve may be the only thing stopping you from enjoying life without chronic and frustrating sciatica pain.

Please mention this sciatica resource when you call or email via the website contact form. You may direct any questions to the contact form as well, or email the doctor directly at [email protected].