“You’re young! You do not have to worry about
back pain.” Not true! New research shows that young and old alike
must contend with disc degeneration. Most of us will personally have
to face disc degeneration’s pain at some point in our lives…or help a loved one coping with its back pain or neck pain
effects. OrthoIllinois Chiropractic is here for young and
old alike when McHenry disc degeneration interferes with your life.
DDD STARTS EARLIER THAN ONCE THOUGHT
It is hard to believe, but it’s documented
in the medical literature. Disc degeneration begins in the late
teens! A study of 18-20 year old healthy
air force cadets discovered that 77% showed
disc degeneration or disc herniation. (1) That’s new news! It has been documented
elsewhere that disc degeneration starts at
age 20. Now it is shown to appear
in 18 year olds! In this study MRIs were done on
all cadets. None of the cadets reported spine pain. On MRI, 30% showed at least one disc was
dehydrating, 13% disc narrowing, 49% disc bulging, 18% disc protruding, 8% disc
extruding, 13% with spondylolisthesis, and less than 1% even showed
asymptomatic vertebral fractures. These findings in young,
seemingly healthy people are similar to what would be expected
in adults. (1) It’s never too early to take
care of the spine! OrthoIllinois Chiropractic takes care of spines at all ages via spinal manipulation, nutrition
and exercise.
WHY?
Researchers (and parents) ask “why?” Why does
lumbar spine disc degeneration or cervical spine disc degeneration begin so young? It may be genetic. 80% of patients in a recent study had mutations
in their collagen-encoding genes. Collagen is important to disc and
joint health. Back pain sufferers with a lumbar disc herniation had two variants in their gene encoding
for aggrecan, a protein that the end plate depends on for load-bearing. Such a mutation
influences the nucleus pulposus, annulus fibrosus and end plates.
(2) Certainly, the whole reason about why a disc
degenerates is not fully defined yet. OrthoIllinois Chiropractic
does have ways to restrain and relieve the pain of
a McHenry degenerated disc.
INTERRUPTING DISC DEGENERATION, PROMOTING DISC REGENERATION
Researchers described disc degeneration as a
cascade of mechanical, biochemical, and structural alterations
at the cellular level, cells that are in an abnormal mechanical environment.
Regeneration of such cells would demand very specific conditions and
would not always be possible. However, traction of 2 to 6 weeks was
found to be a sensitive time for regeneration of a degenerated
disc. The researchers suggest that this could interrupt the above
described cascade of changes. (3) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic uses Cox® Technic
to gently produce a positive environment for the healing of degenerated
discs by enhancing the area of the spinal canal by 28%,
increasing the height of the disc by 17%, and decreasing
intradiscal pressures to as low as -192mmHg in the low back and dropping
pressures in the cervical spine by a mean pressure as much as 1265 mmHg. (4,5)
OrthoIllinois Chiropractic takes it one more step with the Cox® Technic
system of spinal pain management by adding spinal nutrition (particularly
disc nutrition supplementation) and exercise to boost the relief
and clinical outcome for McHenry back pain patients.
CONTACT OrthoIllinois Chiropractic
Listen to this PODCAST
with Dr. Paxton Schofield on The Back Doctors’ Podcast with Dr.
Michael Johnson who presented his care of arthritis and
degeneration with Cox® Technic.
Schedule your McHenry chiropractic appointment at
OrthoIllinois Chiropractic for your spine’s health. You may not be too young for back pain, and you are surely
not too young to look after your spine. A McHenry
chiropractic treatment plan of spinal manipulation, nutrition and exercise can be
good for all ages of back pain and neck pain sufferers due to
disc degeneration.