Lumbar Arthritis: What You Need to Know About Lumbar Back Pain

What is Lumbar Arthritis?

In this modern era, most of the people are nowadays suffering from lumbar arthritis, which is otherwise known as spinal arthritis. However, it's not a condition, rather a kind of symptom, which has been linked with several forms of arthritis that affect your spine. In today's date, the majority of people are experiencing this disease, in which, severe pain arises in their lumbar area of the spine.

Tolerating the deadly pain and soreness in the spine location is not everyone's cup of tea. Often, people get panic attacks and mental disturbances due to the rise in agony and stabbing sensation. Moreover, lumbar arthritis mainly occurs in the joint areas, which are connected with the spinal segments knows as vertebrae.

Due to this interconnection, the pain gets extended towards the spine, and don't allow a person for flexible movements, twisting, bending and sleeping. In addition to this, lumbar arthritis mostly causes lower back pain and stiffness in the body, which is being experienced badly while waking up in the morning, tends to calm and ease with the increase in activities in the office, and become worse towards the end.

Fortunately, there are several treatment procedures for lumbar arthritis, which will help you in reducing the symptoms quickly from the body, so that you will have peaceful nights in the future.  Before delving deep into the treatment methods and procedures, let's have a look at the causes, symptoms, and diagnosis of lumbar arthritis.

Causes of Lumbar Arthritis

Lumbar arthritis, primarily known as osteoarthritis,[1] mostly occurs in the facet joints, which slowly wear away with the pace of time. The facet joints are mainly regarded as the joints, which are present on either side of your vertebra. Moreover, it is also present where your vertebra is joined together.

This symptom causes your bone present in the spine area to grind, as well as push against each other, which develop pain while walking. However, the result of this inflammation develops soreness and stiffness in the human body. Apart from all these things, there are certainly various other factors, which are responsible for causing this dangerous disease in human beings.

The most familiar factor for creating lumbar arthritis is age. With the rise in age, bones suffer from wear and tears and slowly become dull and inactive.

Sometimes due to poor back injuries, people are facing lumbar arthritis signs even from a very young age.

Repetitive stress and strain in the body parts like the back and neck position are more prone towards the risk factors of lumbar arthritis. This may be due to certain activities like football, hockey, weightlifting, and gymnastics.

According to some studies, genetic factors are also responsible for lumbar arthritis.

This could lead to severe pain in the joint areas.

Being overweight is never considered as a good symbol today. Obese people are always in danger zone of suffering from lumbar arthritis.

Soreness in the facet joints lead to transmit the pain in the body, which become more painful and dangerous when treatment procedures will be neglected.

Both of these will cause pain in the lower back position.

Lumbar Arthritis Symptoms

Lumbar arthritis is a common symptom today, which is occurring in most of the families. It usually becomes worse and painful over the time. You might be getting tensed how to detect this disease before it becomes more agonizing. Have a glance at the lumbosacral pain symptoms now.[2]

• Severe back pain, which radiates into the legs and buttocks.
• Loss of the bowel and bladder control.
• Cramping, numbness or weakness in the legs and arms.
• Neck pain, which generally radiates into the arms and shoulder.
• Early morning weakness and pain in the back portion.
• Sharp agony in the fractured area.
• Stiffness in the muscular regions.
• Movement issues.
• Poor twisting and bending.
• Sudden stabbing sensation while performing certain activities.
• Muscle spasms.
• Reduction in the range of your motions.
• Creaking sound in the joints.

Diagnosis of Lumbar Arthritis

Lumbar arthritis is mostly diagnosed based on your pain, frequent symbols, imaging tests, and medical history. For severe cases, X-rays are also taken into consideration to determine the condition of the bone, as well as to analyze the loss of your cartilage or bone damage. Furthermore, doctors often ask to conduct blood tests, which will further clarify other signs like infections, and fungal diseases. Treating lumbar back pain is not at an easy thing today. You always need an expert to treat you well before things move out of your vision.

Lumbar Back Pain Treatment

There are various treatment methods for lumbar arthritis, which are directed by analyzing both symptoms experienced as well as the characteristics of the bone and joint damage. Most of the doctors will suggest you do surgery. But, make sure that you have solid reasons with you to prove why surgery is the only way to stop  lumbar arthritic pain.[3]

If things can be sorted out with natural treatments and medications, then opting for surgery will be considered as a waste. Though, there are various treatment procedures known to mankind regarding lumbar arthritis, some of the best points are mentioned here.

Weight loss

Obese people are often prone to this danger, and face a wide number of issues in their daily life. Starting from the morning activities tonight sleep, they dwell in agony, which is causing due to lumbar arthritis. Thus, to save you from this precarious disease, try to lose weight without affecting your body and sentiments. Moreover, start with low-impact exercises and gradually, move ahead. In addition to this, reduce the calorie and fat portion from the diet. Try to take protein-enriched foods to alleviate the pain quickly.

Exercises

In this tumultuous world, people are quite busy in their lifestyle and have very less time to do exercises regularly. The positive impacts of exercises and yoga are known to those people who are practising physical exercises every day early in the morning. However, people who are suffering from lumbar arthritis are not aware of this fact that exercises are the best treatment methods to reduce the soreness and stiffness from the body.  

Next is, what types of exercises are allowed for you to decrease the pain of lumbar arthritis? Tough, there is an immense number of yoga exercises and techniques listed under lumbar arthritis, but, out of many, few are only possible for the sufferers who are having severe pain. However, before you practice them all, have a thorough look at whether the exercises are convenient for you or nor, or do you need an expert's advice. Swimming and stretching exercises are also included in the list.

Physical therapy

In most cases, physical therapies are used to strengthen the muscles of your lumbar spine. However, the physical therapies are also impressive because they support your spine perfectly by generating stronger muscles and put fewer burdens on the facet joints. Instead of doing all that alone, consult a therapist who can help you in reducing the symptoms of lumbar arthritis.

Hot and cold application

For ages, people are using the heat and ice application for the soreness, inflammation, and stiffness occurring in the body. Both of these techniques are highly effective and show positive results for a particular period. But, in this case, you have to take proper care of the temperature.

Rather, use the ice packs on the swollen areas and put the packs for some time. Moreover, you can also use the hot bags on the painful locations, and don't misuse the temperature. Heat will help in maintaining the flexibility of the body and will promote better blood circulation. Meanwhile, ice is considered the best medicine to reduce the inflammation from the body.

Epidural Injections

Sometimes, to decreases the pain permanently from the body, epidural injections are taken into the picture, which acts as a steroid around the painful or pinched nerves. The cortisone steroid can increase the power of the immune system by relieving the inflammation and ridicules pain from the human body.

Spine fusion

It is one of the surgical procedures, which is used to eliminate the movement in between the adjoining vertebrae.  In case, when all types of treatment will fail to give you peace and relief, spine fusion treatment can be considered a reliable option for severe facet arthritis. There are several types of lumbar back pain treatment available in the society today, but, spine fusion is still leading in the top position.

Quit smoking

Are you smoking regularly? If yes, then stop it today. You might be aware of the danger, which is following you like a shadow every day. Smoking is only considered as a fashion element, which has only bad impacts on human life. For a healthy lifestyle, quit smoking immediately.

What is the importance of having a healthy diet for people who have lumbar arthritis?

No doubt, exercises, stretching, and yoga is important for reducing the negative impacts of lumbar arthritis. But, on the other side of the fence, a healthy diet is too important for maintaining a luxurious and disease-free lifestyle. Eating healthy and nutrients enriched foods are good for decreasing the symptoms of lumbar arthritis.

References

1..https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3606549/

2..https://www.arthritis.org/Documents/Toolkits/Better-Living-Toolkit/OA-brochure.pdf

3..https://uhs.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/LowBackPain.pdf

4..https://www.arthritis.org/about-arthritis/where-it-hurts/back-pain/causes/back-arthritis.php