Low Back Pain - Medications
Low Back Pain - Medications
Medicine can decrease low back pain and reduce muscle spasms in some people. But medicine alone is not an effective treatment for low back pain. It should be used along with other treatments, such as exercise and physical therapy.
Medication Choices
There are several medicines your doctor may recommend, depending on how long you have had pain, what other symptoms you have, and your medical history. The medicines recommended most often are:
- Acetaminophen.
- Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs).
- Muscle relaxants.
- Opiates.
- Antidepressants.
Anesthetic or corticosteroid injections have all been prescribed for chronic low back pain, but they have not been researched enough to know whether they are effective for most people.
You may also hear of people having facet joint injections of anesthetic or corticosteroid for low back pain, but research has shown this to be ineffective or even harmful.
What To Think About
When making treatment decisions, bear in mind that medicines that work for some people don’t work for others. Let your doctor know if the medicine you are taking is not effective. There may be another option to help control your back pain.
Anticonvulsants are sometimes used to treat low back pain, even though there isn’t strong evidence that they help.
Botulinum toxin A (Botox) injection into the back muscles for chronic low back pain is an experimental treatment.
Tags: Acetaminophen, back pain, drug, medication, muscle
What Is Back Pain?
We’ve all experienced back problems from time to time — a pain in the lower back or strain of the neck. In fact, problems from back pain are the most common physical complaints among American adults and are a leading cause of lost job time — to say nothing of the time and money spent in search of relief. Back pain includes sore muscles and tendons, herniated discs, fractures, and other problems. Most often, the causes of back pain have developed over a long period of time.
The spinal column is an extraordinary mechanism. It keeps us stable enough to stand upright but flexible enough for movement. The backbone, or spine, is actually a stack of 24 individual bones called vertebrae.
A healthy spine is S-shaped when viewed from the side. It curves back at the shoulders and inward at the neck and small of the back. It’s the body’s main structural support. It also houses and protects the spinal cord, the intricate network of nerves that runs through the vertebrae to transmit feeling and control movement throughout the entire body.
What Causes It?
Back pain ranks high on the list of self-inflicted ailments. Most of our back troubles happen because of bad habits, generally developed over a long period of time. These include:
- Poor posture
- Overexertion in work and play
- Sitting incorrectly at the desk or at the steering wheel
- Pushing, pulling, and lifting things carelessly
Sometimes, the effects are immediate, but in many cases back problems develop over time. One of the more common types of back pain comes from straining the bands of muscles surrounding the spine. Although such strains can occur anywhere along the spine, they happen most often in the curve of the lower back. The next most common place is at the base of the neck.
Sometimes backache occurs for no apparent reason. This is called nonspecific backache. It may develop from weakened muscles that cannot handle everyday walking, bending, and stretching. In other cases, the discomfort seems to come from general tension, lack of proper sleep, and/or stress.
A condition called fibrositis causes chronic backache from localized muscle tension. Sometimes this original muscle tension comes from stress or other emotional problems.
Whether the muscle strain is from lifting heavy objects or from something as innocuous as a sneeze makes little difference — the pain can be agonizing.
Pregnancy commonly brings on back pain. Hormonal changes and weight gain put new kinds of stresses on a pregnant woman’s spine and legs.
Injuries from contact sports, accidents, and falls can cause problems ranging from minor muscle strains to severe damage to the spinal column or the spinal cord itself.
Tags: back pain, bending, fracures, Pain, pregnancy, weight loss
