Knee Pain Patients Get Relief From Non-Rx Holistic Methods

By Mary Babcock, DO

Knee pain can be devastating to the quality of a patient's health, at any age. Taking the stairs, even walking up a short landing, can make even the most athletic and resilient patient reluctant to take the next step.

Traditional treatments for knee pain can range from rest, physical therapy, to cortisone injections, and, finally, surgery.

Doctors are trained to try to determine the root cause of the knee pain, which could stem from an overall structural imbalance and misalignment of the overall body that may appear seemingly unrelated at first.

When did the injury occur? Where? On which side of the body did the patient land in a fall? This fall may have caused instability of the pelvis, which later caused knee pain. So, the knee may not be the source of the pain; it is a symptom, rather than the actual cause.

Therapy

Pain medications can address pain, but they do not address the source of the issue. New innovative approaches including regenerative therapies coupled with osteopathic manipulation and physical therapy can get the patient back on track. Additionally, nutritional support can have a substantial impact on healing.

Prolotherapy and Regenerative Healing

Regenerative medicine is a fast-growing field using highly-developed technology that is increasingly being used to manage conditions such as chronic and acute pain. The primary goal is to replace damaged, diseased, degenerating, or aging tissue with new tissue. Prolotherapy stimulates the body's natural healing mechanisms to lay down new tissue in the weakened area.

Medical Acupuncture

Used widely in Chinese medicine, acupuncture is a technique in which practitioners stimulate specific points on the body.
Studies conducted at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other credible institutions, suggest that acupuncture may help ease types of pain that are often chronic such as lower-back pain, neck pain, and osteoarthritis/knee pain.

Hypnotherapy and Medical Massage

Hypnosis can alleviate the sensory and other components of a pain experience. By causing relaxation, it redirects the attention from the sensation of pain. In addition, medical massage offers numerous benefits, including increasing joint flexibility to releasing endorphins the body's natural painkiller.

A new age is dawning in medical care combining the arts of science and medicine. Credentialed doctors trained in both conventional and alternative healing techniques can bridge the best of both disciplines.

When doctors and patients forge trusting partnerships, and patients are treated holistically from head to toe, patients get the best results.