Scoliosis Surgery – Is It Worth the Cost?
nutritional guidelines, patients can integrate back-friendly vitamins and nutrients into their diets.
Posture & Body Balance Training There is now a huge body of research on outpatient physiotherapy, intensive inpatient rehabilitation, and bracing that’s proven the effectiveness of exercise in scoliosis treatment. A paper from researchers in Turkey published in the Saudi Medical Journal on Schroth’s three-dimensional exercise therapy — that I use at my clinic for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis — found that after six weeks, six months and one year, of therapy, all patients had an increase in muscle strength. What’s more, they also reported a significant improvement in their postural defects.
I however do a thorough radiographic evaluation before prescribing a personalized exercise regime, a precise “blue print” to work from to each of my patients. These specific exercises that I devise for each of my patients (We call them “Neuromuscular Re-Educative Exercises” at my clinic) even re-trains their mind-muscles for maximum, long-term and more permantent results.
Chiropractic
Children with mild scoliosis treated with chiropractic adjustments have shown a reduction in their spinal curvature, according to the findings of a three-year, 3,000 study funded by the Foundation for Chiropractic Education and Research.
It is imperative that a scoliosis suffer gets treated from a trained chiropractor with good knowledge in treating scoliosis. Too often and untrained manual therapist will try to “click and “crack” the spine to push it back into place. While this method works for a normal spine a person it wont for a scolioctic spine but may actually increase the Scoliosis.
State of the art medical devices
There are several state-of-the-art medical devices that I use at my clinic, namely:
Vibration therapy
The Russian cosmonauts first investigated vibrating platforms as a way of maintaining bone & muscle mass while in outer space.I first began using vibration therapy as a way of retraining the brain’s control over the muscles more effectively. When you stand upon the vibration machine, your postural muscles have to make multiple, rapid adjustments – as many as 50 times per second to adapt to the stimuli and balance accordingly. For this reason, exercises & spinal rehabilitation performed with vibration therapy can be as much as 3 times more effective than if they were done alone!
Meditrac & Vertetrac
This is a huge improvement over the traditional traction devices devised by Dr. L. Stabholz and Dr. A. Grober. These doctors found that applying differential traction to patients with an antalgic lean (Sciatic Scoliosis) helped in restoring normal upright stance and decreasing muscle spasm, often leading to full recovery. Meditrac & Vertetrac are now extensively used in the patient’s rehabilitation process and accelerating blood flow to the tissues and intervertebral discs at my clinic.
Shockwave Therapy Shock Wave Therapy implies the application of high-intensity ultrasonic acoustic radiation for the treatment of certain musculo-skeletal disorders. The machine focuses high energy sound waves on the injury through a protective pad that breaks down scar tissue and calcifications in the area, resulting in structural changes in the tissue, stimulation of bone growth, regeneration of the lost tissue and calcium absorption by the body, all of which are great for a full or partial recovery from scoliosis.
Non-Surgical Spinal Decompression This FDA cleared technology relieves pain by enlarging the space between the discs. The treatment has been found to be remarkably effective in severe cases of herniation, degeneration, arthritis, stenosis and pressure on the nerve root. According to a clinical study performed by the Orthopedic Technological Review in 2004, 86% of all cases experienced spinal pain relief with disc decompression.
When is the best time to treat my Scoliosis?
It is always advisable to correct your scoliosis or any back problem as early as possible before it spirals out of control. With timely intervention, we are able to reduce the curve to an ideal 5 degrees or less, thus defeating the disease rather than taming it.
The only thing to be borne in mind is that while surgery is usually over in a day or two at the hospital followed by subsequent rehabilitation, my program requires a lot more consistent effort, dedication and time. The advantage is that its significantly cheaper and safer than surgery.
Just think about it. Over 650,000 surgical procedures are performed annually for back pain in the United States that cost in excess of billion per annum. “Can this money not be put to some better use,” questions Dr. Gunnar Andersson, former chairman of the department of Orthopedics at Rush. Dr