May 26, 2025
As a Corrective Chiropractor near downtown Toronto, I hear this story all too often from frustrated patients with chronic low back pain. There were doing months of physiotherapy, chiropractic and/or massage therapy with minimal progress. They see their family doctor who requests an x-ray which comes back with ’lumbar degeneration’ (wear and tear of the spine but not the root cause of their pain). The family doctor tell them to continue doing physiotherapy treatment and to wait months for a lumbar MRI (an expensive imaging modality that takes a more detailed picture of your spine). The patient is still pain for countless months and finally gets their MRI back…’L4/L5 disc bulge’. The patient thinks that this is the answer to all their problems but the family doctor says that this is not serious enough for surgery and that he can refer them to a pain specialist. Confusing, I know!!
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