I was doing some poking around on PubMed today and saw something that caught my eye. I was reading an abstract entitled “Spontaneous disappearance of lumbar disk herniation within 3 months.” I know the topic of disc herniation has been discussed on the podcast where many people will exhibit disc herniation especially in older populations. Do disc herniations actually heal or just become asymptomatic? Do they “go away” with the bulge actually receding or do they just “stop causing pain” with the bulge still being present? Is just this just misinformation in the literature? I will be extremely honest here, I have no idea about a lot of physiological mechanisms so I could be asking a really stupid question.
Hi guys, there is also a significant amount of apposing evidence in works and trials being done by Dr Stu McGill discussed with / by Chris Duffin, in which McGill suggests that discs do not heal. Chris Duffin and McGill talk a lot about this in relation to McGills book Back Mechanic. Im not suggestion i know ‘the answer’ but his evidence states discs dont heal they ‘adapt’ and change. sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse depending on range of personal factors and, lifting heavy weights can actually make disc adaption much worse. There a lot of talk in powerlifting media atm about lifting for back pain…gotta be careful here, dare i say ‘nuanced’ issue that is risky for people misinterpreting these information
Its up to individual interpretation but in my mind , the body, overtime, ‘may’ re-absorb extruded disc material back into the nucleas, i repeat ‘may’. , but chris, theres no proof in anything in life accept your human interpretation of it, is it true the ground you walk on is earth? you were your taught this, its actually just someones opinion that was agreed upon. its data set analysis, the bigger that data set, the longer and bigger period the test results repeat themselves we assume its ‘proof’. Back to topic, read ‘back mechanic’ by McGill, a must read
Hi Austin, I was talking in reference to Chris’ comment asking about evidence/proof of something, specifically discs healing, so I was discussing that almost everything is subjective, including whether or not discs do really ‘heal’. I was referring Chris to Dr McGills work also who talks about this in his research suggesting that herniated or extruded discs may be re-absorbed, but may not ‘heal’ to prior ‘fixed’ state. Sorry for confusion.
It’s only “subjective” as far as how you’re defining “healing”.
If you’re defining it as a complete return to 100% pre-injury structure (as McGill appears to be suggesting), then no, I suppose they don’t - in fact, under this definition, no injury ever “heals”.
If you’re defining it as a return to the full previous level of function without pain or physical limitation (as I prefer to), then yes, they do.
Thanks Austin, I think what you’ve said summarised things nicely , really useful description particularly for those battling with low back pain and herniation’s. trying find some relief amongst the masses of confusing information out there .