Emerging technologies: Preliminary Findings. Decompression, Reduction, and Stabiliazation of the Lumbar Spine: A cost-effective treatment for lumbosacral pain - Back Pain Research

Emerging technologies: Preliminary Findings. Decompression, Reduction, and Stabiliazation of the Lumbar Spine: A cost-effective treatment for lumbosacral pain
April 1997
C. Norman Shealy, MD, PhD, and Vera Borgmeyer, RN, MA
C. Norman Shealy MD, PhD, is Director of The Shealy Institute for Comprehensive Health Care and Clinical Research and Professor Of Psychology at the Forest Institute of Professional Psychology. Vera Borgmeyer is Research Coordinator at the Shealy Institute for Comprehensive Health Care and Clinical Research. Address reprint requests to: Dr. C. Norman Shealy, The Shealy Institute for Comprehensive Health Care and Clinical Research , 1328 East Evergreen Street, Springfield, MO 65803
AJPM Vol. 7 No. 2

INTRODUCTION
Pain in the lumbosacral spine is the most common of all pain complaints. It causes loss of work and is the single most common cause of disability in persons under 45 years of age (1). Back pain is the most dollar-costly industrial problem (2). Pain clinics originated over 30 years ago, in large part, because of the numbers of chronic back pain patients. Interestingly, despite patients' reporting good results using "upside-down gravity boots," and commenting on how good stretching made them feel, traction as a primary treatment has been overlooked while very expensive and invasive treatments have dominated the management of low back pain. Managed care is now recognizing the lack of sufficient benefit-cost ratio associated with these ineffective treatments to stop the continued need for pain-mitigating services. We felt that by improving the "traction-like" method, pain relief would be achieved quickly and less costly.

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