Is my pain coming from my hip on my back?
Individuals who are experiencing hip pain are often certain that the hip is to blame. At times though, the lumbar spine is actually the culprit. The reason is that spinal stenosis may cause referred pain into the area. Spinal stenosis represents a condition that may occur with age.
As individuals age, arthritis develops in the spine and soft tissue and bony overgrowth may
Spinal Stenosis
start to compress nerve roots. We don’t really want or need this overgrowth of tissue and bone, but the body sees it as a way to stabilize arthritic joints as it can no longer make enough cartilage to sustain the joint surface. The end result is that the nerve roots as they come out of the spine have less room to exit, and start to get pinched.
This can lead to buttock and hip area pain and pain that radiates down into the thigh. As a result, people may think they’re having hip pain when in actuality it may be due to spinal stenosis.
How does the doctor tell the difference? Well this comes down to history, physical examination, imaging studies and diagnostic testing. If a person has a lot of pain with activity and x-rays show significant hip arthritis and they have tenderness right over the joint and pain with range of motion of the hip, that’s pretty much a slam dunk diagnosis for hip arthritis pain.
One other thing that can be done as both a diagnostic and a therapeutic test is to inject the arthritic hip with numbing medicine and steroid medication. This should provide immediate relief to the pain as well as provide a few weeks to months of pain relief due to the steroid medication. If it is not as clear-cut on the workup that the hip is the culprit, the injection into the hip can be performed as a diagnostic test to see how much pain relief is actually achieved.
If 50% pain relief is achieved, it may be that there’s an overlap between arthritis of the hip and spinal stenosis. They made simply be both occurring at the same time. In addition to this, lumbar epidural injections for the spinal stenosis may be in order to obtain the additional pain relief needed.
So it is important to understand that pain in the hip does not necessarily mean the person has a hip joint problem. Seeing pain management doctors in Arizona can help delineate the problem’s source and then treat it most effectively.
If you have significant hip pain in Arizona, come see the best pain management clinics in the valley. Arizona Pain Specialists has Double Board Certified pain management doctors who are experts in the work up of hip pain. These Arizona pain management clinics have several locations serving the whole valley including Phoenix, Scottsdale, Mesa, Glendale, Chandler, Tempe and more.
Call 602-507-6550 today for schedule.