Recently I read an article on how ozone gas may be used in future herniated disc treatments. From what I have gathered, the experiment has shown that injecting ozone gas straight into the spine where the injury occurs may show some hope for relief of lumbar herniated disc pain.
Although a spine pain professional has is doubts, supporters are arguing that ozone therapy could become quite common in the coming years.
One researcher has helped around fifty patients with a mix of ozone and oxygen. Since 2005, he says, fifty to sixty percent of the patients can be treated with ozone therapy which is a minimally invasive procedure. Kieran Murphy, MD, a radiologist from the University of Toronto has some hopes for ozone therapy as well and has said that it could even help some patients avoid back surgery.
The doctor did his research and in a yearly convention with the Society of Interventional Radiology he expressed his findings. Using his own animal research and studies he claimed that ozone therapy could help shrink the herniated disc. And we know how important this is for treatment. A shrunken herniated disc cannot pinch nerves that cause radicular pain.
One in ten patients with herniated discs need this treatment. At some point in your life, you will suffer from lower back pain along with eighty percent of adults in the United States.
Herniated discs cause radicular pain depending upon where they’re located. Lumbar spine herniated discs, for example, cause pain in the legs, buttocks, and general leg weakness. Cervical spine herniated discs cause pain in the arms and shoulders.
Fifty percent of people with herniated disc pain will recover in about 30 days. And the vast majority of people will be better in 3 to 6 months without invasive surgery of any kind.
Doctor Scott D. Boden, who leads the Emory Orthopedics and Spine Center in Atlanta, Georgia says that “About ten percent of those with a herniated discs end up having to use surgical options to recover from a herniated discs, and about ninety percent never require surgery”.
Because of this fact, it is hard to provide proof that ozone therapy would even work to help heal a herniated disc. The reason being is that it would be hard to tell if ozone therapy is actually working or if the patient is recovering on their own.
Ozone therapy for herniated discs has been used extensively in Italy. More than fourteen-thousand herniated disc patients were treated with ozone therapy where this therapy was created. Doctor Murphy became aware of ozone therapy in 2003 while visiting a medical conference in Venice.
He was quoted as saying this treatment is either “madness” or “genius”. Doctor Murphy became so intrigued by the treatment that he patented the idea and developed his own Oxygen and Ozone treatment device which is about the size of a roll of quarters.
Like other minimally invasive procedure, a computer imaging program helps guide the needle to the injury during the surgery. A minor anesthetic is used on patients during the surgery to help minimize pain (like other surgeries). Ozone therapy has shown promise because Doctor Murphy has stated that most of his patients that were treated have expressed less pain within two days of the therapy.
In the San Diego meeting, Murphy presented his studies. Out of the 12 studies and 8,000 patients he could confidently say that ozone thearpy is as effective as surgery when it comes to relieving herniated disc pain. There is also a much lower chance of complications because in traditional herniated disc surgeries part of the disc is removed. Quicker recovery times have also been reported in the analysis.
The medical community remains skeptical and with many questions of ozone therapy but for Boden, he believes that one day ozone therapy will become the standard for treating a herniated discs.
More studies and research are needed but for now the effects of Ozone therapy are unknown, however there is a light at the end of the tunnel for those that don’t want a invasive surgery.
