Anatomical vs Biomechanical

Anatomical Vs. Biomechanical Spine Pain

This seems like a very simple concept, but it is one that if explained to the MD properly will open up doors to their offices and patients.  Remember, you have to be able explain it in bullet points.  In fact, it works extremely well with patients as well, I just reviewed a neighbors MRI and had the exact same discussion.   Here is the long version, please read it over and over until you can condense it down to the talking points. 

There is only 2 reasons a patient’s spine will hurt, that is an anatomical reason such as a disc herniation, fracture, tumor or infection.  The second is a mechanical problem, which is due to the spine compensating for an injured structure such as a ligament.  The truth is that everyone that has spine pain has a mechanical component while only a percentage of those people have an anatomical cause.  If it were all anatomical then we could simply put up the MRIs of all the spine patients and they would all look the same.  We know that they do not.  Medicine is full of providers that specialize in anatomical therapies for spine pain…surgery, injection and medication.  There is only ONE profession that is trained specifically to address the mechanics of the spine and that is Chiropractic.  Although we have many different therapies or techniques to treat the patient, where Chiropractic’s strength is, is in the ASSESSMENT of the mechanical or biomechanical abnormalities in the spine (AKA Chiropractic treats the CAUSE of the problem..remember?)

This is the #1 reason why spine surgery can fail…the SURGERY did its job by stabilizing the area and fixing the “Anatomy”, but what was left unaddressed was the underlying MECHANICAL issue!  So doesn’t it make sense that since every patient with spine pain has a mechanical component and only a percentage of those patients have an anatomical component that we START with a provider that is trained to diagnose the difference and triage accordingly?  

Please practice that over and over and I will be adding more!