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Spinal Decompression In San Antonio
Before discussing our San Antonio office's non-surgical spinal decompression program, we'd like to address some... Misconceptions, Misleading Statements, And Outright Fraud Regarding Spinal Decompression
Spinal Decompression - What Is It?Spinal decompression is a technologically advanced type of traction. It uses special, computer-controlled traction motors that pull at specific angles and can adapt to the body's reactions and keep the muscles around the spine relaxed during the treatment, rather than resisting it. It is this ability to keep the muscles relaxed that allows spinal decompression to achieve far superior results to what can be achieved with regular traction. Spinal decompression is designed to create a suction force within the spinal discs to pull back in bulging disc material and to pull in fluid and nutrients that assist in disc healing and regeneration processes. Click the "Play" button on the video below to get a better understanding of what occurs during spinal decompression treatment:
Although ordinary traction does decrease spinal disc pressure somewhat, it does not create enough suction to actually pull the bulging disc material back in towards the center of the disc. Studies on regular traction machines have shown that regular traction reduces disc pressure from about 90 mmHG (normal disc pressure) down to approximately 30 mmHG. This may be helpful to a small extent in some cases, but it is simply not enough to substantially reduce disc bulging in most cases. In contrast, investigations done using the first spinal decompression machine developed (the "Vax-D"), showed that disc pressure could be reduced to -150 mmHG (that's NEGATIVE 150 mmHG!) and below. This is a relatively strong suction that can usually quite effectively pull the bulging disc material back towards the center of the disc and away from sensitive nerves. Again, the big difference in the effects between spinal decompression and regular traction is due to the ability of spinal decompression systems' computer-controlled motors to instantly correct for the body's reactions to the treatment and thereby maintain relaxation in the paraspinal muscles and negate their resistance. This is also why patients find spinal decompression so much more comfortable than regular traction - they don't feel like their muscles are being pulled apart! Over a period of time and repeated treatments, the disc wall gradually stabilizes and heals so that the retraction of the bulging disc material is maintained and the tissues of the disc are rehydrated. As the health and thickness of the discs imroves over time, spinal decompression treatment may also reduce the mechanical pressure on, and the inflammation of the spinal "facet" joints (the inflammation of these joints is callled facet syndrome). Decreased pressure on the facet joints may help to slow, stop, or possibly even reverse the progression of spinal joint degeneration.
What Is The Effectiveness Of Spinal Decompression?Spinal decompression research studies place the effectiveness of this form of treatment at around 85% to 90%, but in "real world" application, it is somewhat less. In the formal research setting, "less than ideal" patients can be excluded from the study results and researchers can throw out the results of test subjects when they don't follow the treatment protocol 100%. In working with real patients who often present with complicating factors like obesity, diabetes, high stress, heavy smoking, etc., and who may tend to miss appointments, not follow home-treatment advice, etc., the success rate is closer to 75% to 80%. In our San Antonio spinal decompression clinic, we provide other treatments in addition to spinal decompression, so determining the success rate for spinal decompression treatment alone is difficult, but our overall success rate including even complicated cases and less-than-fully-compliant patients is about 80%. It is important to note that we define success as the patient being able to comfortably return to normal activities whereas the statistical success rate for many treatments (such as injections and surgery) is based on ANY noticeable improvement in symptoms, with or without any improvements in the patient's physical abilities.
Is Spinal Decompression Treatment For Everyone?No, it certainly is not! There are certain restrictions and contraindications for spinal decompression treatment. There are very few absolute contraindications because it is a relatively safe and gentle treatment. Even so, spinal decompression cannot be performed on patients who:
Besides the contraindications just mentioned, there are conditions and extenuating circumstances that would result in us refusing a patient for spinal decompression. These situations are handled individually by the treating doctor. One important thing to remember is although it is much less disruptive to one's daily life than spine surgery, spinal decompression does require a commitment of time and effort on the part of the patient for a successful outcome. Unwillingness or inability to follow our treatment recommendations will unfortunately force us to exclude an individual from our treatment program. Our focus is on getting you the best results possible, and if you can't or won't help us to help you, we must decline your case in favor of other patients whom we can better serve. If this occurs, we assure you that our decision to exclude a patient is nothing personal, but simply a necessity if we are to put our talents and efforts to their best use.
What About Costs And Insurance For Spinal Decompression?We get this question a lot, but this is not the best time or place to answer it. There are simply too many variables on cost and insurance coverage for a specific individual to be able to give any sort of reliable answer. The first question is whether you are even a candidate for spinal decompression treatment. If so, the next question that must be considered is how many spinal decompression sessions are needed and what other treatment needs to be performed in our San Antonio office, or needs to be performed by other providers on our referral. These considerations can produce wide variations in total cost. Insurance coverage also presents many individual variables to consider. Although a given insurance company may usually provide coverage for our services, a given patient might unknowingly have an exclusion on coverage for any treatment for a specific diagnosis, they may have a particularly high deductible to meet, or there may be some other policy issue that effects the amount their insurance company will cover and pay. Most insurance companies will not even provide us with any coverage information without a formal diagnosis for the individual patient, so we must perform an evaluation and come to a diagnosis (we offer these services free of charge to prospective decompression patients) before we can reliably determine insurance benefits. In short, cost and insurance issues must be handled on a case by case basis once we have done our evaluation and diagnostic procedures. It is for this reason that we offer our initial evaluation and diagnosis free of charge, because we don't want our patients to incur significant out of pocket costs before we even know if we can accept them into our treatment program. Most people just want to know if there's a way to get better without surgery, and if they can afford to get the treatment they need in order to do that. We'll make sure you know everything about your treatment costs and insurance coverage before you incur any out of pocket costs in our office.
Schedule a FREE consultation and evaluation with one of our doctors to find out if you are a candidate for our spinal decompression program. Call (210) 408-7888 today!
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