Most
people experiences pain on the neck, shoulders and arm. While at times, it’s
all due to long days at work, we may not realize that there’s actually an
underlying problem that’s causing the pain. One of the possible causes is what
they call a ruptured disc or cervical herniated disc, which occurs when the
cushions between the vertebrae in the upper back and neck (cervical disc)
bulges out through the outer cervical disc wall.
Causes
Either
we do it regularly or just occasionally, heavy lifting or similar damaging
activities and motion, tobacco use, lack of exercise, inadequate nutrition, and failure to practice good posture can put too much pressure on the disc that results to pain. Sometimes,
aging triggers this as well. Pain that intensifies if the damage reaches the
spinal canal or nerve roots.
Symptoms
You may
consider it as a red flag for a cervical herniated disc when you start
experiencing pain, numbness, weakness or tingling that runs from the arms
through the hands until your fingers. In some cases, this conditions triggers
spinal cord compression that may call for an intensive treatment plan. You’ll
know when you have it when symptoms like awkward or stumbling gait, fine motor
skills in the hands and arms difficulty, tingling or “shock” sensations at the
torso or into legs, are manifesting on your body.
Stages
Here
are the 4 stages of a ruptured or herniated disc:
- Disc Degeneration
Our
body go through a lot of changes when we age, especially our bones.
Intervertebral disc weakens due to chemical changes, despite of a herniation.
When this happens, our bones becomes fragile since its ability to absorb shock
from movements has diminished.
- Prolapse
More
known as bulging disc or protruding disc, wherein there’s a little nucleus
pulpous (jelly-like inner disc material) trapped in the narrow opening in the
annulus fibrosus (tire-like wall).
- Extrusion
This
happens when the trapped nucleus pulpous finally managed to break through
annulus fibrosus but stays within the disc.
- Sequestration or Sequestered Disc
Now the
jelly-like inner disc material opens the tire-like wall and comes out from the
intervertebral disc and into the spinal canal.
Diagnosis
After
the doctor puts you through physical examination which involves x-rays, MRIs,
CT scans, CT myelogram or bone scans. Your doctor may also ask you to do some
positions or make a certain movement in order for him to detect some
limitations of movement in the spine, balance difficulties, fluctuations in
reflexes, weakness in muscles, damage in your senses, or reflex abnormality
that hints that involves your spinal cord. That, and your medical history plus
your symptoms, your doctor will conclude your exact condition.
Alternative Treatments
Most of
the time, through medication the pain from a herniated disc diminishes within
just a couple of weeks up to a few months. However, the numbness or tingling sensation may take a while before it improves.
Your
doctor may suggest the following for treatment:
·
Physical
Therapy - to relieve
the pressure on the nerve root.
· Epidural
Steroid Injection And Nerve Root Injection - to relieve your hips and legs from the
acute pain and fight inflammation.
Surgical Options
You
have to understand that you should consider surgery as your last option. Don’t
decide to have a surgery unless the pain has progress for 6 to 12 weeks, or the
pain started from tolerable then turned to unbearable.
Here are the two possible surgery procedure:
Here are the two possible surgery procedure:
·
Discectomy—or partial disc removal, wherein they
will only remove a small portion of the bone in the front of the neck also
called anterior discectomy.
·
Laminectomy—which involves the back of the neck also
known as posterior laminectomy.
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