One of the most common treatments for a bulging disc recommended is the use of steroids. The most common method that these are given to an individual is in the form of an injection. But anyone who has done any research about this treatment knows that it can be a little controversial.

So, are injections a good option when it comes to the treatment of a protruded disc? And what is the difference between a cortisone or other steroid injection and an epidural?

The fact of the matter is that every treatment has a time and a place when trying to help with this health problem, and whether you choose to have in injection of any kind really depends on your goal. But before you make your decision, it’s important to have all the facts about your treatment options.

First, it’s important that you realize what is actually going on when you suffer with a bulging disc so you understand why a health care provider would recommend this course of action to start with.

When a disc herniates, it will tend to apply pressure on one of the spinal nerves. This is actually what can make this health problem very painful, because the nerves are very sensitive to pressure of any kind.

This is also why the pain associated with a herniated disc tends to be a traveling type of pain. For example, if you have a herniated disc in your neck, typically the pain will not just stay in your neck. It will also tend to radiate into the shoulders and arms, possibly even lead to a headache and other problems in addition to that.

When you have pressure on a nerve, the body will initiate a process called inflammation to try and heal the injured area. What happens is that the body will send a lot of blood to the injured area, the purpose of which is to bring fresh oxygen and nutrients to the area for healing purposes.

And although this sounds like a good plan, if you have a lot of blood in the area, it will swell up and cause more pressure to be applied to the nerves. So, this process can result in more pain for the person suffering with a herniated disc.

The reason a health care provider would recommend a cortisone or other steroid injection for this health problem is because all steroids have an anti-inflammatory effect on the body. So they will slow the rush of blood to the area, decrease the swelling that surrounds the nerve, and this is how they provide relief.

However, there are some serious side effects to cortisone and other steroid injections, the main one being that steroids can eat away at the surrounding joints and result in further problems with that area of the back in the future. This is why you aren’t able to have more than 3 injections of steroids per year.

This is also the reason that many doctors will recommend an epidural instead of a steroid injection. An epidural is just an anesthetic, which means that it numbs the inflamed nerve and calms it down so your pain is reduced.

Epidurals don’t have that negative side effect that steroid injections have, so they are typically much safer.

However, in both cases you have to understand that your relief will typically be temporary. Both steroid and epidural injections will mask the pain, but they do not actually heal the condition (which is the herniated disc).

This can be very deceiving for people, because we tend to associate pain with the problem, and most individuals would think that because the pain is gone, the problem must be gone. Well, this isn’t actually the case with a herniated disc, and many will actually go about their business because they think they’re fine, and then the condition just becomes worse over time.

As a bulging disc therapy, the success rate of these types of injections is about 50%, and the relief you experience will generally last up to 3 months. Some people don’t experience any relief, while others experience relief that lasts longer than 3 months.

The video above is 1 in a series of 20 that I’ve created to answer the most frequently asked questions that individuals have about treatments for a bulging disc. If you’d like to see all 20 videos in this series, you can click the following link (herniated disc treatment).

Be Sociable, Share!

•