When a sudden back injury occurs or chronic pain flares, a wide range of treatment options can provide pain relief and healing. Individual conditions and lifestyles make some remedies more effective than others, so back pain patients may have to sample or combine several of them.
The key to reducing pain is to avoid further injury while seeking or undergoing the right care. Improving strength and flexibility in the back when pain subsides will help prevent or reduce the frequency of relapses.
Home Treatments
Most types of back pain respond to home treatment, which should be part of any chronic pain management plan. The American Chiropractic Association reports that occasional muscle or joint soreness and stiffness can be treated naturally with hot and cold compresses. Tender areas can be worked through stretching exercises that both condition and increase the patients' range of motion and flexibility.
Activity Management
Following an acute injury or when chronic episodes of pain are severe, the University of Maryland Medical Center recommends brief bed rest followed by gradual return to exercise. Managing activity levels according to the body's pain threshold removes the source of pain when necessary and restores muscle tone afterward. This self-treatment option takes persistence on the part of patients, who must gauge and work within the boundaries of their physical conditions.
Physical Therapy
Extreme injuries or flare-ups of chronic pain from overuse may need the help of professional physical therapy. Physical therapists are trained in managing both types of pain and restoring the body to health.
According to the American Physical Therapy Association, treatment options include targeted exercise, anti-inflammatory medications, and lifestyle guidance toward effective body mechanics. This type of professional therapy is customized to patients' changing physical capabilities and degrees of back pain.
Cortisone Shots
In back injury cases that don't respond to other remedies, spasms and other causes of pain can be addressed with injectible medications. The Cleveland Clinic notes that a physician can administer cortisone or another anti-inflammatory shot to ease acute pain.
Alternative Medicine
Noninvasive therapies to address chronic pain can be sought on a regular basis. According to the Cleveland Clinic, some alternative therapies treat the cause of pain rather than focusing on pain relief or tissue repair. These include licensed massage, chiropractic and acupuncture care.
Surgery
As APTA and the Cleveland Clinic note, surgery should be the last choice for back pain management. Bone degeneration and extensive soft-tissue damage, however, may warrant it. Treatment options include laminectomy, discectomy and spinal fusion, which may incorporate stabilizing hardware.
