Sciatica refers to pain, numbness, or tingling that begins in the lower back and continues down the sciatica nerve into the buttocks and legs. Sciatica is not a disorder itself, but rather a symptom of some other underlying cause, usually pinched nerve or herniated disk in the lower back or lumbar disk herniation (LDH). When a spinal disk herniates, the gel-like substance between the vertebrae can creat pressure around the nerve causing pain and dysfunction.

Doctors have a very hard time telling a person specifically why their back hurts. In the US every year back pain affects millions of individuals, with the total cost of care exceeding $100 billion annually. Even the best trained doctors who see patients with pain in the back on a regular basis including pain management doctors, spinal surgeons, chiropractors and others can only tell a person approximately 50% of the time effectively why their back hurts.

Pain is a characteristic of 2,186 disease conditions according to one medical resource. This contrasts with some people who experience no pain whatever. Wouldn’t it be great to live your life without pain? NO, not really! Pain is your body’s communication method to alert you when something is wrong.

Care for a slipped disc injury is often simple. A short period of pure rest and medication is usually sufficient. For slightly more serious cases, physical therapy may be required.

For over 3000 years acupuncture has been used for treatment of pain in China. So with regards to Eastern medicine, it’s obviously been ingrained in their culture definitively. When it comes to Western medicine though, over the past few decades acupuncture has been increasing in popularity.