From Chronic Pain to Healing: What Your Carrolltown Chiropractor Wants You to Know About Recent Discoveries
If you suffer with chronic low back pain, you know how trying it can be when treatments only provide transitory relief. While we don't have all the answers yet, new research is helping us all better understand why discs degenerate and exploring new approaches that may eventually offer more effective treatments. Gormish Chiropractic & Rehabilitation is keeping a close eye on all of this to help our Carrolltown back pain patients most effectively.
Understanding Your Disc Health: The Hydration Factor
Your intervertebral discs act as cushions between your vertebrae, and they're mostly made up of water-rich molecules called proteoglycans. When these discs lose their water content over time, they can't absorb shock as well, contributing to pain and further breakdown. While staying hydrated won't heal disc problems, it may support your discs' natural function—though we still need more research to fully understand this connection. We can talk more at your next Carrolltown chiropractic visit about ways to hydrate your discs.
Early Promise: Lab-Grown Disc Components
Research by Chopra and colleagues (1) has shown progress in creating "biomimetic proteoglycans"—lab-made versions of your disc's natural building blocks. In laboratory studies, these engineered molecules can simulate some properties of healthy disc tissue. However, these studies are just beginning, and it may take time to determine if this treatment will be both safe and effective for people|this research is still in its infancy, and it will likely be some time before we know if this approach can safely and effectively help human patients like our Carrolltown back pain patients.
Why Decompression Techniques May Help
Exploring Natural Pain Pathways
Some of the most preliminary research by Melrose and colleagues (3) is exploring whether compounds from natural sources, including venoms (wow!), could be developed into targeted pain treatments. This research remains in initial development and centers on learning about pain pathways rather than coming up with ready-to-use treatments. It may be many years before we see real-world applications, if any emerge at all. Fasincating!
What This Means for Your Current Treatment
While these research developments are hopeful, they don't alter your immediate treatment options. What they do suggest is:
- Lifestyle factors like hydration and movement patterns may be more important than we previously grasped.
- Current treatments your chiropractor uses may have stronger scientific support than before.
- Future treatment options are being researched, though timeline and success remain uncertain.
- Managing expectations is critical—innovative therapies need extensive time to create and verify their safety.
The reality is that back pain treatment remains challenging, and while research is advancing our understanding, most of these discoveries take time. Your best approach remains working with your Carrolltown chiropractor at Gormish Chiropractic & Rehabilitation who knows current evidence-based treatments like Cox® Technic while staying informed about emerging research.
CONTACT Gormish Chiropractic & Rehabilitation
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. James Cox, on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he describes how The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management talks about disc degeneration and the back pain that comes with it.
