Around 619 million people worldwide suffer from chronic lower back pain. When such pain lasts for months, it can start shaping your life. You may avoid exercise, struggle to sleep, cut back on work or hobbies, and plan everyday activities around how much your back hurts.
Chronic back pain also isn’t one single condition. Arthritis, damaged discs, irritated nerves, spinal stenosis, muscle problems, and other disorders can all cause persistent symptoms. That’s why finding the source of your pain matters.
At North of Atlanta Pain Clinic in Duluth, Georgia, we use a conservative, interventional approach to chronic back pain. Depending on your diagnosis, one or more of these five nonsurgical treatments could provide meaningful relief.
Physical therapy remains one of the foundations of chronic back pain treatment. Staying active generally produces better long-term results than extended bed rest, but simply exercising more isn’t always enough.
A physical therapist can develop exercises that target the muscles supporting your spine. Treatment may focus on improving strength, flexibility, posture, balance, and movement patterns.
Physical therapy can also reduce pressure on irritated structures and make everyday movements easier. We may recommend it alone for some conditions or combine it with interventional treatments when pain makes rehabilitation difficult.
Injections allow us to deliver medication directly to a suspected source of pain rather than relying solely on oral medication. Different injections serve different purposes, so depending on your symptoms, we may use:
For example, an epidural injection may help when inflammation around a spinal nerve contributes to sciatica, while facet injections target the small joints connecting the vertebrae.
Some injections also help us pinpoint where pain originates. If temporarily numbing a specific nerve significantly reduces your symptoms, that information can help guide your next treatment.
If small nerves supplying painful spinal joints keep transmitting pain signals, radiofrequency ablation (RFA) may offer longer-lasting relief than an injection alone.
During RFA, we guide a thin needle toward the targeted nerve and use radiofrequency energy to disrupt its ability to transmit pain signals. The procedure doesn’t remove the underlying arthritis or degeneration, but it can reduce the pain those changes generate.
We often use diagnostic medial branch blocks before RFA. If the block significantly eases your pain, it suggests that the targeted nerves contribute to your symptoms and that RFA may help.
The nerves can eventually regenerate, so pain may return. However, patients often experience substantial relief for months before they need further treatment.
Regenerative treatments aim to use biological materials to support your body’s healing processes. At North of Atlanta Pain Clinic, options include platelet-rich plasma (PRP) and stem cell treatments.
PRP therapy starts with a sample of your own blood. We concentrate the platelets, which contain growth factors involved in tissue repair, then inject the preparation into the treatment area. In selected cases, we can also use concentrated cells from your own bone marrow.
Research into regenerative therapies for chronic low back pain continues to develop. Current evidence supports potential benefits for certain patients, but these treatments don’t regenerate an entire damaged spine or guarantee pain relief.
We consider your diagnosis, previous treatments, imaging, and overall health before deciding whether regenerative medicine is worth pursuing.
Some chronic back pain comes primarily from abnormal or persistent nerve signals. This may happen with conditions like sciatica, neuropathic pain, or failed back surgery syndrome.
Spinal cord stimulation (SCS) uses mild electrical impulses to change how pain signals travel through your nervous system before they reach your brain.
One major advantage is that you can try SCS before committing to a permanent device. We first place temporary leads for a trial period. If stimulation noticeably reduces your pain and improves your function, we can discuss permanent implantation.
SCS doesn’t repair spinal damage, but for appropriately selected patients with persistent nerve pain, it can significantly change how much pain interferes with everyday life.
No single treatment works for every case of chronic back pain. The key lies in matching the treatment to the structure or nerve causing your symptoms and combining therapies to optimize results.
We evaluate your symptoms, medical history, examination findings, and imaging or nerve studies when appropriate. From there, we build a treatment plan designed to reduce pain and improve function without automatically turning to surgery.
If chronic back pain keeps restricting your life despite the treatments you’ve already tried, call North of Atlanta Pain Clinic at 770-559-8385 or click here and complete the online form to find out which nonsurgical treatments could help.
