Lumbar spinal stenosis affects the lower part of your spine, making the spinal canal narrower. If you develop lower back pain that suggests you have lumbar spinal stenosis, contact board-certified pain expert Asher C. Goldstein, MD, and his team at Zephyr Medical in the Brooklyn Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. They diagnose the cause of your stenosis and offer advanced treatments like minimally invasive lumbar decompression (mild®) to relieve your pain. Call Zephyr Medical today or book an appointment online to benefit from the highest quality care.

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What is lumbar spinal stenosis?

Spinal stenosis is where the spinal canal narrows. Lumbar spinal stenosis affects the lower (lumbar) region of your spine. You can also get cervical spinal stenosis in your neck.

Inside your spinal canal is the spinal cord. This is the starting point of all the peripheral nerves that spread throughout your body. When you have lumbar spinal stenosis, the narrowed spinal canal can compress or pinch one or more nerves.

This causes lower back pain that makes it hard to complete daily activities. You might struggle to work or even walk very far. The pain can extend from your lower back into your buttock or leg (sciatica). You might also develop numbness or weakness in your legs.

Lumbar spinal stenosis pain is usually worse when you stand or walk, improving when you sit or bend forward.

What causes lumbar spinal stenosis?

Changes in your spine caused by aging and wear-and-tear are the most common triggers of lumbar spinal stenosis. Of these, the leading causes are:

Arthritis

Arthritis causes changes to your spine’s alignment and thickens the ligaments, the tissues that connect one bone to another. Bone spurs (small lumps of bone your body makes to reinforce a weakened spine) also form. These problems can cause lumbar spinal stenosis.

Herniated discs

The discs between the vertebrae (bones) protect your spine from damage and help keep it stable. A herniated disc happens when the core, a jellylike material, pushes through the outer casing. Degenerative disc disease is a leading cause of herniation because the discs dry out and weaken, increasing the risk of the outer case tearing.

You can also develop lumbar spinal stenosis if you have a spinal tumor or anything else that takes up space in your spinal canal.

How is spinal stenosis treated?

Spinal stenosis symptoms often improve with nonsurgical treatments like physical therapy and anti-inflammatory medication. If these aren’t enough, the Zephyr Medical team offers several cutting-edge treatments that might help. Epidural and facet joint steroid injections and nerve block injections reduce inflammation and pain for most people.

If they don’t work, Zephyr Medical’s experts might recommend radiofrequency ablation to destroy the affected nerves, lumbar disc gel sublimation to shrink a problem disc, minimally invasive lumbar decompression (mild) to remove thickened ligaments, or spinal cord stimulation to scramble pain signals to your brain.

Call Zephyr Medical today or book an appointment online for attentive, effective lumbar spinal stenosis treatment.