Physiotherapy heals gently and slowly. No medication / non-surgical way of treating spine 

What causes a slip (herniated) disc?

  1. Violent injury or the normal ageing process
  2. Everyday activities- lifting heavy objects the wrong way, 
  3. Stretching too hard during a sports activity, 
  4. Commonly happens in the neck (cervical spine) or lower back (lumbar spine).

How can physiotherapy reduce pain and disc pressure? 

To know how does physiotherapy helps first we need to know about the occurrence of events at spine after prolapsed disc.

The disc is slipping behind

Whenever disc herniation occurs muscles try to protect slip of the disc, as a result, there is sudden muscles spasm because of which their sudden onset of pain and slipped disc, causes a lot of inflammation when it presses surrounding ligaments and vessels. 

The situation worsens when a person tries to move with stiff back more pain results due to the wrong movement of the muscle. If painkillers are taken then to an extent they help to reduce inflammation and spasm, but the prolapsed disc is a mechanical problem. Compression of ligaments and occlusion of blood vessel persists. Pain comes back to stopping painkillers.

Physiotherapy works on the disc compression by correcting the alignment (posture). With manual therapy (mobilization) and electro-therapy instruments compression and pain reduces.

Manual therapy

Later exercises are prescribed in opposite direction of disc compression so further compression can be reduced and strong muscles can support the spine inefficient way.

spinal decompression

Physical therapy works on the cause of the pain, not just suppresses it.