Dr. Stefano Sinicropi, M.D.

Back pain is hard enough to manage when it’s housed in one specific spot in your back, and it only becomes more complex when it radiates to other locations or throughout your extremities. Radiating back pain is typically a sign that a neural pathway has become compressed or irritated, and it’s important that you work to treat the problem before the nerve damage gets any worse, as that can lead to more intense or longer lasting symptoms. Below, we explore some of the treatment options for overcoming radiating back pain.

How To Treat Radiating Back Pain

For mild to moderate radiating back pain, or for nerve symptoms that come and go based on your activity, here’s what we typically recommend to our patients.

1. Gentle Movement – Oftentimes people think the best way to put an end to these radiating symptoms is to rest and stop moving altogether. While that may work in the short term, that’s not going to address the root issue that’s causing the nerve to be compressed. Gentle movements and daily activity helps to restore normal flexibility and function in the affected area, working to gradually decompress the irritated nerve. You want to limit direct or intense strain on your spine, but you don’t want to completely eliminate stress on your spine. Gentle, controlled stress can help decompress a pinched nerve.
2. Physical Therapy – The vast majority of patients dealing with spinal nerve issues would benefit from physical therapy exercises. Not only does physical therapy expand your comfortable range of motion, it also strengthens specific muscles and soft tissues in the vicinity of the compressed nerve. When these structures are stronger, they can better handle stress that is placed on the area, limiting strain on the affected nerve. This strengthening is decompressive in nature and helps restore normal function to the area. Most patients notice gradual but continual improvements in their spinal function as PT helps to decompress the irritated nerve.
3. Activity Modification – Activity modification is a fancy way of telling the patients that we want them to avoid certain activities while still remaining active overall. Again, we don’t want you to just rest for weeks and hope the nerve discomfort resolves, because that can lead to spinal segmental weakening and muscle atrophy. We want you to stay active but avoid specific activities that could trigger symptoms. High-impact activities and actions that lead to significant bending or twisting are smart to be avoided, but listen to your body and learn which actions can be comfortably performed and which ones you should steer clear from in the short-term.
4. Professional Treatment – If you’re struggling to get a handle on your radiating back pain at home, consider syncing up with a professional. Not only will a specialist be able to pinpoint the precise location of the nerve compression, but they can also offer some more hands-on treatment in the event that conservative treatment isn’t working. Manual therapy, corticosteroid injections and even minimally invasive decompression procedures are available to patients who aren’t responding as anticipated to conservative care. We’ll work to find the right solution for your radiating discomfort so that you can get back to enjoying movement and activities without shooting pain.

Radiating back pain is unlikely to resolve without proactive treatment, so don’t just stick your head in the sand and hope you’ll just wake up one day without pain. It’s much more likely that you’ll wake up with worse back discomfort than you had the day before, so take radiating pain seriously and pursue home-based or professional care management strategies. For assistance overcoming radiating back pain or a different spinal issue in the greater Twin Cities area, we hope you’ll connect with Dr. Sinicropi and the team at Midwest Spine & Brain Institute today at (651) 430-3800.

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