Why Does It Hurt You Somewhere Else?

Sometimes where you feel your back or neck hurting is not where the problem is. Referred pain occurs when pain sensors from structures deep in your body such your joints, ligaments, muscles or internal organs meet branches of the pain sensors from your skin in the spinal cord or your brain.

If one of these deeper structures is injured or irritated, the pain signals it sends out you may often perceive as coming from the area of skin associated with it. With referred pain, the area of the body you feel the pain is not the problem. This means when we’re trying to help fix you, we might not end up working where you feel the pain is coming from. We often get comments about this. However it’s good to say something in case we’re off target.

It is referred pain that often makes finding your correct diagnosis and treatment plan more challenging. The area of your body that you feel the pain could and might have multiple different contributory causes. Referred pain can come from bones, joint capsule, ligaments, tendons, muscles, fascia, blood vessels and organs.

For example pain in your shoulder area might originate in your neck or internal organs, because the nerves from these areas merge together in your nervous system.

Of course if you’re not getting better then you might be right – we might be missing something in the local area where you are feeling the pain. Sometimes there are adhesions in the soft tissues and peripheral nerves that are tricky to find. We’ll need to reassess you if you’re not improving. Depending on your pattern of symptoms and what we find, we might need to recommend you check in with your GP for blood tests and scans.

For the vast majority of people who see us the Preston Chiropractor and Preston Massage Team at Back-in-Action is very effective at helping relieve back and neck pain, headaches and many other aches and pains and helping to find and sort out the underlying causes.

From the Preston Chiropractor Team
Getting You Back in Action & Enjoying Your Life Again
Serving the people of Preston and surrounding areas including Southport and Lytham St Annes