|
| Back
pain - physical symptom of Alzheimers? |
|
Question:
My mom appears to be in the mid stages of al. We've been coping with the
usual stuff but something new has entered the picture. The last two months
she wakes in the middle of the night with severe pain in her back and later
it's been her leg. Initially, we took her to the Dr. for her back and she
was treated with two shots of cortisone in her back and motrin.
That
seemed to cure the back and as soon as that was better she started waking
up with severe pain in her knee. During the day she is fine and won't stay
off her feet but in the middle of the night she cries with pain. She went
to the Dr. who has given her two shots of cortisone in the knee and has her
on some strong pain medication - but the pain persists.
Is this another
symptom of the disease. I've searched for information on this area of
symptoms but can't find anything. She is only seeing a family doctor in a
rural area. He seems to have identified her as having AL but is treating
this complaint as something different than the disease.
We just can't
believe its not related somehow. x-rays have not revealed any damage to
these areas or reason for the pain. It is very frustrating - my dad is the
one who must take care of her and needless to say I'm afraid it's taking a
toll on him. Any thoughts.
Answer:
The fact that the pain occurs only at night should be a
significant symptom for a specialist to pick up on to determine the cause.
I've never heard of AD causing this particular symptom and I don't recall
anyone else reporting such a thing on this ng since I began reading here in
mid-April.
I not too long ago suffered a severe injury to the muscles in my back. The
pain was quite intense, especially when I awakened in the night. Even now,
though the injury is completely healed, when I wake sometimes my back is
very, very stiff, which is painful. Also, a back injury can begin involving
other muscles, like the legs (or arms, shoulders, neck, etc). What happens
quite often is a person unconsciously begins to compensate for the injured
muscle by using another muscle to do more share of the work...then that
muscle can get injured from the extra strain. My lower back pain started on
the right side, then moved to the left side.
This is only my opinion, so take it as you like, but my advice would be to
have mom checked out by a chiropractor. What I found is that MD doctors can
do very little to treat back pain/injuries, other than prescribe/administer
pain relief. It's good to have the pain relief, but it's only a very
superficial treatment of the underlying problem.
Chiropractic receives a lot of knocks from some sectors of our society and I
wouldn't see a chiropractor for a lot of the things they claim to treat
(diseases, etc). But for back injury/pain they are the best, IMO, and
conventional medical science has nothing to compete with chiropractic.
BTW, with a muscle injury, nothing will show up in an x-ray. A chiropractor
can tell from examination with his/her hands if a muscle is damaged. So the
fact that your mom's x-rays have been clean tells me nothing really. It
doesn't mean she doesn't have a very real, pain-producing muscle injury.But
a competent chiropractor will do a complete examination and evaluation and
will be able to determine if the area of pain feels abnormal. They usually
will do an x-ray too to look for any affect of the muscle tensing on the
spine, which can be very painful.
A back muscle injury can occur very easily, especially if this person is not
in top physical shape. The muscles are weak and then the person exerts
herself somehow (even lifting or bending the wrong way) and the muscle can
tear. Many times, the pain isn't even noticeable until the person has been
sitting or lying in one position for a long time (like sleeping) and then
the muscle begins to cramp and spasm. If this is what's happening to your
mom, I'm not at all surprised she's waking in acute pain. The pain from this
type of muscle spasming is almost indescribeable....for me, it felt very
close to labor pains when I had my son.
Chiropractors now have a wonderful treatment for muscle injury. The patient
lies flat on a table and the chiropractor places a pad over the injured
area. A current of low-voltage electricity is run through the pad, causing
the muscle to vibrate at high speed for about 20 mins. It's not painful,
just very strong tingling. But the vibrating causes the muscle to completely
relax and breaks the spasming. After one session I felt a major improvement.
After a little over a week, I was completely recovered.
I can't recommend chiropractic highly enough for anyone experiencing serious
back or other muscle pain. I strongly urge you or your dad to have your mom
evaluated by a competent chiropractor ASAP. Both your mom and dad could be
on the way to peaceful, uninterrupted sleeping very soon.
In the meantime, when your mom wakes in extreme pain, tell dad to try making
an ice pack for her....put a good amount of ice in a plastic bag and wrap
the bag in a towel. Then have mom lie back with the ice pack under the part
of her where the pain is its worst for about 20 minutes. Stop then and put
the ice pack back in the freezer so it will be ready the next time you need
it. I bet anything mom and dad will be amazed at the relief she
gets...enough so that she should be able to get back to sleep pretty easily
after that.
I know none of this is about AD, but I thought I would post my reply anyway.
Back pain is so common, I thought many people who read this ng might benefit
from hearing what I've learned from my own recent experience.
 |
|
|
|
