Tag Archives: facet injections

The Difference Between Facet and Epidural Steroid Injections

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For chronic back or leg pain, there are a few procedures in pain management today that are extremely common. Facet injections and epidural steroid injections are the most popular outpatient procedures performed for obtaining pain relief today. What is the epidural steroid injectiondifference between these procedures?

From the neck all the way down to the sacrum, they are approximately the size of a thumbnail and contain cartilage just like other joints of the body such as the hip or the knee.

So if a person has chronic back or neck pain and physical exam and imaging studies confirm the arthritis, steroid injections into the symptomatic facet joints can help for months at a time. Of note, when an Arizona pain management doctor performs a facet injection, the needle does not go into the spinal canal. This is because the facet joints are located in the back of the spine outside of the area where the spinal cord and nerve roots reside.

The predominant indication for a facet joint injection is chronic neck or back pain due to facet joint injectionfacet joint arthritis. If an individual has a significant leg pain or arm pain component, this typically results from nerve roots being compressed. This is when epidural steroid injections come into play.

When a nerve root gets pinched, it is often the result of a disc herniation, which is commonly known in layman’s terms as a slipped disc. This can compress a nerve root and cause significant inflammation which then leads to either sciatica in the leg or what is called radiculopathy in the arm.

In the case of spinal stenosis, arthritis forms in the spine which overgrows bone and soft tissue. This can compress one or multiple nerve roots leading to leg or arm pain as a result.

In these instances, a facet injection is not going to help symptoms from the pinched nerve. It would be an epidural steroid injection that should be performed. This involves a Phoenix pain management doctor placing the needle into the spinal canal and placing steroid medication around the area of the pinched nerve.

There are a few different varieties of epidural steroid injections, and all of them involve placement of steroid into the spinal canal. Interlaminar injections are the simplest and involve medication being placed right over the spinal cord area.

A transforaminal epidural injection involves placing the needle at the point where the nerve root leaves the spinal canal, and this achieves placement closer to the area of nerve root Pain Management Mesa AZcompression. A caudal epidural steroid injection involves medication placement at the lowest area of lumbar spine, which is excellent for reaching multiple areas of nerve root compression.

So one big difference involves where the medication is placed. Facet injections go right into the small joints in the back of the spine, and epidural injections involve medication placed right around the spinal cord and nerve roots.

The other big difference is the indications for these procedures. Facet injections are from chronic neck or back pain, whereas epidural steroid injections are indicated for sciatica and radiculopathy due to nerve roots being pinched.

Both of these injections have been performed for decades in pain management Phoenix because they work very well. Epidural steroid injections have been shown to provide good to excellent pain relief in over 75% of those receiving them.

Facetinjections have approximately the same effectiveness. Epidural injections may be given as a series 1 to 2 weeks apart for a total of three injections, which may be repeated every few months.Arizona Pain Specialists

If you live in the Phoenix and Scottsdale metropolitan area and are looking for the premier pain clinics in Arizona, let Arizona Pain Specialists help you. The pain management doctors and chiropractors are Board Certified and Fellowship trained with the most comprehensive options available.

Call today at (602) 507-6550!

The Natural History of Spinal Arthritis – from an AZ pain center

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Unfortunately as a person ages, degenerative arthritis is one of the most common medical occurrences that happens. People continue to make cartilage in their joints at the same rate as before, but the rate at which it is lost accelerates and arthritis occurs. The joints of facet arthritisthe spine, which are called facet joints, are about the size of a thumbnail and there are two at each level of the spine all the way up and down.

Here is the natural history of spinal arthritis. The initial problem that occurs, which usually begins in a person’s 20s or 30s, is degeneration of the intervertebral disc. The disc itself is composed of 80% water, and through trauma or genetics or other reasons we don’t know it starts to lose some of that water content and degenerate over time.

This degeneration may or may not be painful. Studies have shown that a lot of people have degenerative disc disease and don’t even know it. So as this degeneration occurs, the motion at that level of the spine becomes biomechanically abnormal. Significant forces are shifted to the back part of the spine, which is where the facet joints are located.

As a facet joints see these abnormal forces, they begin to degenerate as well. This may pain clinic arizonainclude the formation of bone spurs in the joint, or overgrowth of soft tissues around the joint itself or even in the spinal canal. The development of arthritis in the facet joints is known as facet syndrome.

This can lead to back pain from the arthritic process when the cartilage is lost in the soft tissue overgrowth, or it may lead to a condition called spinal stenosis as the bone or soft tissue overgrowth can pinch nerves as they try to leave the spinal canal.

The abnormal motion that is created by spinal arthritis is the primary reason that a person has significant pain. Most spinal arthritis in middle-age can be treated without surgery, as doing an extensive spinal fusion for degenerative arthritis (without scoliois or instability) is usually not a good idea.

Studies have shown that as a person continues aging with spinal arthritis, eventually the process gets to a point where the tissues start to stiffen considerably. Although this may sound like a bad thing, in actuality what it does is start to lessen the pain a person feels. In addition, because there is so much range of motion contributed by the hips and the pelvis and other spinal levels, an individual can still maintain considerable range of motion in the back even though stiffening is occurring.

phoenix pain clinicSo the eventual result is typically that the pain from spondyolarthritis decreases over time and a person is able to increase his or her activities. For example, if spondyolarthritis necessitated a person to stop playing golf for a few years, the increased stiffness may allow the pain to decrease and a person to start playing golf again.

The natural history of arthritis is different in the spine that it is for a typical extremity like a hip or knee. Nonoperative pain management for this arthritis typically works very well, And if you or a loved one is experiencing back or leg pain then Arizona Pain Specialists can help you. These Arizona pain centers have multiple locations Valleywide which consist of Board-Certified and Award-Winning pain management doctors and chiropractors providing comprehensive arthritis treatment options.

The clinics accept Medicare, Medicaid, Blue Cross, Aetna, CIGNA, United, banner,best pain management in phoenix Humana, Worker’s Compensation, personal-injury liens, self-pay and many other insurances.

Call today for one number scheduling at 602-507-6550.

Pain Management Scottsdale AZ Clinic Has 12 Pain Treatments

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When you are dealing with a chronic pain problem, it can seem as if there’s no hope to get it under control. Maybe it’s chronic neck pain after a car accident, or a pain management scottsdalefailed back surgery. At times, sciatica can persist from spinal stenosis, and surgery is a last resort you want to avoid.

Arizona Pain Specialists has pain management Scottsdale doctors who have over 12 treatment options to help you get out of pain and avoid surgery. It is extremely unusual to see such a comprehensive Scottsdale pain clinic, but that’s the model put together by Arizona Pain.

Here’s a list of what types of treatments are available with the Scottsdale pain management doctors:

  • Medication Management
  • Back or neck bracing

    Facet Injection

    Facet Injection

  • Joint Injections for hip, knee, ankle, etc.
  • Stem Cell Injection Study for Low Back Pain
  • Facet or epidural injections
  • Spinal cord stimulator
  • Radiofrequency ablation
  • TENS Units
  • Chiropractic Treatment
  • Spinal Decompression Therapy
  • Acupuncture
  • Behavioral Therapy

The pain doctors at Arizona Pain are Double Board Certified and Fellowship trained. You will be in the best hands! The clinic also has an Open MRI machine on site along with a chiropractor Scottsdale.

The  nonoperative success rate at Arizona Pain is well over 90%. Call Today to get started at (480) 535-7370.