Ten Minute Tip #17: Understanding Spinal Radiculopathy, Positional & Localized Back Pain in Barbell Training & Powerlifting with Dr. John Petrizzo, PT, CSC, PRSCC, SSC
LOW BACK PAIN IS ONE OF THE MOST COMMON REASONS PEOPLE GO TO THE DOCTOR. IT’S A VERY COMMON DISORDER AND SOMETHING HUMANS WILL EXPERIENCE WHETHER THEY ARE ACTIVE, SEDENTARY, BARBELL TRAIN, OR DO ANYTHING AT ALL. BUT BACK PAIN CAN BE REALLY SCARY AND WHEN WE’RE IN THE THICK OF IT, WE MAY FEEL LIKE IT WILL NEVER GO AWAY.
In this episode of the PRS Podcast, PRS Clinical Coaches Drs. John Petrizzo, Alyssa Haveson & Rori Alter sit down to discuss the three types of back pain:
Radiating back pain
Position-dependent back pain
Localized back pain
Check out this episode for a down and dirty rundown of each of them to help you figure out what kind of back pain you have and what you should do about it!
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Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:01:23] Welcome back to the Progressive Rehab & Strength Podcast. I'm your co-host, Dr. Rori Alter, head clinical coach here at Progressive Rehab & Strength, with my lovely co-host, Dr. Alyssa Haveson, and another clinical coach here at Progressive Rehab & Strength, Dr. John Petrizzo, Professor at Adelphi University in exercise Science teaches kinesiology, biomechanics, sports medicine, all those good things. And we're back today with a ten-minute tip we'll discuss as a follow-up to our kinesiology and functional anatomy lecture on the back. We're going to be talking about different types of back pain. So back pain is not always in your back, and you can have symptoms elsewhere and not in your back, and it can be coming from your back. So, John, can you talk to us about the three types of back pain we see: localized back pain, positional back pain, and radicular back pain? And what we should do about like very quickly like this is a ten-minute tip, what we should do about them and which ones we should be most concerned about.
Dr. John Petrizzo, PT, CSCS, SSC: [00:02:35] Well, to start, I think if we're talking about which ones to be most concerned about, I would say radicular right because that's radiating. That, by definition, means that the pain is radiating from your back to another part of the body. Right. So it's going to involve the nervous system. The peripheral nerves could have a variety of causes like a bulging or herniated disk, or it could be advancing spinal stenosis, something like that, that anything that compresses the peripheral nerve through its course, you know, to whatever, if it's in the upper extremity or lower extremity. So radicular symptoms are more concerning than localized back pain. Right? Localized back pain can happen for various reasons, but we are typically less concerned about that.
Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:03:33] Can you describe to us what like what do radicular symptoms feel like or how people describe radicular symptoms? Because there are multiple different sensations that you can feel. So what are people looking for if they are experiencing radicular symptoms?
Dr. John Petrizzo, PT, CSCS, SSC: [00:03:53] Most commonly, they talk about numbness, tingling, and sometimes burning sensations. Those are the three most common that I hear about from people.
Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:04:06] I would also say a dull ache, like throughout the whole region of that nerve distribution.