Newsletter: The Mystery of Persistant Back Pain

Lower back pain has been a challenge for all professions. In fact, many years ago, the Wall Street Journal reported that lower back pain is more prevalent than the common cold. Medicine, osteopathy, chiropractic, acupuncture, physical therapy and many allied professions have tackled this epidemic malady with varying results. Of these, the chiropractic profession has had the best success record in dealing with this painful condition, although results can depend upon the pain’s cause and point of origin.

Generally speaking, there are three main causes of pain: injuries, mental stress, and poor nutrition. All three can throw the involuntary – or autonomic – nervous system, controlling all unconscious body activities such as heart rate and digestion, out of balance.

Disturbance from the autonomic nerve centers registers in the abdomen, also called the solar plexus. The nervous system functions as a great relay or “reflex” system and, eventually, tensions in one region, such as the abdomen, will “refer” to other locations in the body. This process, called “referred pain,” is going on at all times without our being aware of it. In effect, when a threshold of irritation has been reached in the primary area of disturbance, new and different symptoms will arise at a distant location. For example, eating too much or too rich food over-burdens the stomach, but when enough irritation is built up, a headache manifests. The headache is the effect, but the stomach the cause.

One chiropractic method, developed by Terrence Bennett, D.C., holds promise by working with sources of back pain that originate from causes in other parts of the body. Dr. Bennett, in searching for more efficient ways to treat pain, especially lower back pain, developed a system of reflex diagnosis and treatment that worked with the abdomen, called Neurovascular Dynamics. By locating tense or sensitive areas in the abdomen, he was able to access the functional state of all internal organs, and then determine if back pain was coming from a remote body area.

Bennett expanded the possibilities when he found that the large intestine, prostate, and adrenals could be related to back pain. But, more importantly, Bennett found irritations of the so-called “Second Unit of Digestion” (liver, gall bladder, head of pancreas, and pylorus) could not only affect the right shoulder but also the lower back area.

Dr. Bennett focused on the Second Unit of Digestion because it is the most metabolically active area in the body. It is a giant biochemical factory that produces all the enzymes, bile salts, and acids necessary for food breakdown. George Crile, M.D., a well-known medical author, noted “that the rich nerve supply about the liver and gall duct is comparable to the telephone exchange in a large city.” Impaired function in this area affects all abdominal organs and the entire body.

This idea has also been expressed by Francis Pottenger, M.D., author of “Symptoms of Visceral Disease,” and a true believer in reflex pain, who stated: “Irritation of the gall bladder and liver causes reflex pain in the right shoulder.” In the cause of pelvic pain however, Pottenger was much less certain.

Further affirmation is obtained from Guyton’s Physiology, a standard medical text, which states: “Often a person feels pain in a part of the body that is considerably removed from the tissues that are causing the pain. This pain is called referred pain.” Left arm pain coming from a heart condition reflects this principle.

What are the implications for us?

In all cases of persistent low back pain, it is best to locate a practitioner skilled in Neurovascular Dynamics in order to determine if nerve stressors from other areas of the body, especially the organs in the “Second Unit,” could be slowing down the healing process. By removing these irritations through gentle manual methods, the Inner Healer within each of us then has a better opportunity to re-balance and resolve this condition.

Neurovascular Dynamics principles and treatment are employed at Friedman Chiropractic, Inc. Please call the office for more information.

Full citations for this article are available upon request.

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