Spinal Decompression Therapy

Many people suffer with chronic neck or back pain that has not responded favorably to conservative treatment such as chiropractic care, physiotherapy, exercise, weight loss, etc.  Sometimes CT or MRI evaluation reveals that the pain is caused by a disc bulge, disc herniation or any one of a number of other causes.  Although surgery is often recommended, many are hesitant because of the inherent risks of surgery.

Certainly, the decision of whether or not to undergo surgery should not be taken lightly.  Most people wisely want to try everything else first before they would ever consider having surgery.  Furthermore, when surgery is performed on a patient that has tried everything else first, surgery is much more likely to be successful than if surgery were performed on someone that would have responded favorably to a non-surgical approach.

However, all surgery has certain risks we are all aware of.  In addition, surgery never heals a disc bulge or herniation; it just removes disc tissue in order to remove the pressure of the disc upon the nerve.  This removal of disc tissue however weakens the disc and often renders the disc more vulnerable to another disc bulge or herniation, which would require another surgery.  In addition, spinal surgery often results in accelerated degenerative changes to the discs above and/or below the level of surgery.

Spinal Decompression Therapy is a non-surgical treatment that is very effective at reducing or eliminating chronic back and neck pain in the vast majority of cases, even those that involve disc bulges or disc herniations.  In our office greater than 90% of our patients experience a 90% or greater reduction in pain.  Most of our patients experience complete relief of their pain with Spinal Decompression Therapy.

Rather than removing disc tissue as surgery does, Spinal Decompression Therapy creates a negative pressure (vacuum) within the disc that helps to pull the disc bulge or herniation back inside the disc, which removes the pressure from the nerve and reduces or eliminates the pain.  In addition, this negative pressure causes the disc to create new fibrous tissue (type 4 collagen fibers) within the disc that actually help to HEAL the disc.  This leads to greater disc health and stability and reduced risk of disc bulges or herniations in the future.

In order to maintain our outstanding success rate, I am very selective in the patients I accept for care.  Before I will accept any patient for Spinal Decompression Therapy, I thoroughly review all of the patient’s medical records (including CT, and MRI films as well as pain control and surgical reports).  After the review of records I perform a comprehensive consultation and examination.  I want to make sure that everybody is able to receive this evaluation, so I provide this service at no charge.  I only accept those patients I truly believe I can help.