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Spinal Pain Management

Discography

A discogram is a minimally invasive procedure used to determine whether or not disc degeneration is the cause of a patient’s pain. Discography may be a very important diagnostic tool in cases where multiple discs are degenerated or where there may be a cause for pain other than a degenerated disc.

In discography, the doctor places a small needle, through the skin and directs it into the disc itself. The procedure is performed with precision x-ray guidance. Once the needle is in the disc, dye is injected. When dye is injected, the physician will ask the patient if any pain is experienced. It will be important to determine whether the pain is representative of the patient’s typical pain or not. The physician will also be able to measure the pressure in the disk when pain is provoked. The combination of the type of pain response and the measured pressure in the disk will help to determine if the injected disk is the cause of the patient’s back pain.

After the disc is injected, a cat scan of the back will be performed. The cat scan provides a picture of what the disc looks like after the dye injection. This picture may also prove useful in determining whether the disc degeneration is significant and what kind of procedure, if any, is necessary to fix the disc.

Arrow denotes the disc spaces of the lumbar spine. Dye is seen within the spaces following discogram. The top space was the only normal appearing space

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