PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — On any given day, about one in four adults is dealing with back pain. As common as it is, back pain can also be one of the most challenging problems to solve.
Physical medicine and rehabilitation can be an important tool, though some say it’s not used often enough.
“I’ve been having back pain for over, almost 40 years,” says Sarah Lewis of West Oak Lane Philadelphia.
Lewis spent decades on her feet all day as a nurse’s aide, then caring for aging parents. Wear and tear on her spine was making everyday activities painful.
“My pain start from the middle of my back, go to the lower part of my spine, comes all around my hip, and it started to go down my legs,” she explains.
She needed more relief than injections alone gave, but she didn’t want surgery.
Another doctor referred her to Dr. Tommie Berry, Jr. at Temple Health, a specialist in physical medicine and rehabilitation – also known as a physiatrist.
Dr. Berry says his goal is to restore function.
“It is challenging to not be able to do the things that you were previously doing before,” he says.
First, he listens to the patient.
“They may not say it in doctor or medical terms, but they will try their best to tell you what’s going on,” Dr. Berry says.
He has a group of questions to guide the conversation: Where is the pain? And what makes it better or worse?
Patients may say, “It gets better when I lean forward on the shopping cart or it gets worse when I bend back.”
Does it change with the time of day, or the weather? All are clues on whether it’s a muscle or nerve issue. He also does a physical exam.
“Are they walking with a limp? Are they kind of guarding or leaning on one side?” he says.
Strength and reflexes also help him zero in on a diagnosis.
For treatments, patients always have the final okay.
“I will typically talk out loud and walk them through my rationale,” he says.
Lewis says a combination of topical and oral medications and exercises have her moving better.
“It helps a lot. And I owe all that to Dr. Berry,” she says.
“I want you to be the best version of you that you can be. I’m just here to help navigate that for you,” he says.
Dr. Berry says people will likely feel some benefits between five weeks and three months, if they put in the work with at-home exercises.
And he says he can tell when patients aren’t doing their part, just like your dentist knows when you aren’t flossing.
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