Minimally Invasive Therapies

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For patients with severe back pain related to arthritis, one treatment option is a medial branch block. This procedure blocks the nerves that transmit pain from the small joints of your spine. For the right patient, a radiofrequency ablation of these nerves can provide long term pain reduction.

Pain is a complex electric transmission in the spinal cord. Chronic pain is pain that can no longer be controlled by the brain. Spinal cord stimulation uses electrical impulses (that you can’t feel!) to change the chronic pain signal. Patients with severe neuropathy, back pain and other conditions may benefit from this therapy.

 Severe pain that is unresponsive to other interventions may benefit from an implanted device that infuses pain medication directly into the spinal fluid. This device is called an intrathecal pump and is frequently used for the treatment of cancer pain and severe back pain.

Fractures of the spine can be a painful process. These can be related to osteoporosis and sometimes cancer. When this occurs, a procedure called a kyphoplasty can be performed. This procedure uses cement in the fracture to stabilize the bone to provide pain reduction.

Leg heaviness and back pain that get worse with walking and standing can be a sign of a condition called claudication. Devices can be implanted between the bones of the spine that can relieve the crowding around the nerves, allowing for improvement in walking and standing.

Some patients have claudication as a result of thickening of the ligamentum flavum ligament in the spine. Using a small incision, this ligament can be thinned, creating more space around the nerves that go to the legs. This procedure is frequently called a MILD (minimally invasive ligament decompression). 

As we get older, degenerative disc disease can limit quality of life. The discs themselves can be a source of pain. There are substances that can be injected into the disc to help regenerate disc height and shape.