Table of ContentsView AllTable of ContentsAdvanced SymptomsTreatment OptionsManaging Advanced SciaticaCan You Heal Chronic Sciatica?Seeing a Pain Specialist
Table of ContentsView All
View All
Table of Contents
Advanced Symptoms
Treatment Options
Managing Advanced Sciatica
Can You Heal Chronic Sciatica?
Seeing a Pain Specialist
Sciaticais a condition that causes nerve pain down the legs and affects many people at some point in their lifetime. While sciatica tends to resolve after several weeks with rest, exercise, and medications, sometimes sciatica symptoms can last much longer.
Advanced or chronic sciatica lasts over 12 months and can cause leg pain, numbness, and weakness, significantly interfering with daily activities.
This article will discuss chronic sciatica symptoms, treatment options, and when to see a healthcare provider.
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Symptoms of Advanced or Chronic Sciatica
Advanced or chronic sciatica often produces pain that travels down the back of the leg. In addition to pain, long-term sciatic nerve compression can also result in numbness, tingling, weakness, and instability of the legs, which can impact your ability to walk.
Severe nerve compression can progress to leg paralysis if the sciatic nerve is significantly damaged from chronic compression.
Sciatica can progress to nerve damage of the smaller nerves that branch from it and travel into the legs and feet. Nerve damage is broadly referred to as neuropathy and can result in pain, tingling, and loss of sensation.
How Long Does Sciatica Last? Understanding the Duration and Finding Relief
Treatment Options for Disabling Sciatica
When sciatica becomes severe and disabling, affecting your ability to walk, more involved treatment beyond exercises and at-home treatments is typically needed to get pain relief.
Many cases of chronic and disabling sciatica are due to problems with the lumbar spine. Compression of the nerve roots that form the sciatic nerve can occur from bulging or herniated discs orspinal stenosis. If symptoms of sciatica persist beyond 12 months with little or no relief from exercise, physical therapy, or pain management techniques,surgeryis often needed to treat severe sciatica symptoms.
Lumbar decompression surgeryis a broad term that encompasses several different procedures that can be performed in the operating room to create more space in the lumbar spine and reduce nerve compression. During lumbar decompression surgery, your surgeon may perform:
Sciatica Surgery: Everything You Need to Know
How to Manage Advanced Sciatica: Daily Relief
To get daily relief from advanced sciatica symptoms, at home treatment methods like taking a warm bath or shower or applying a heating pad to your lower back or glutes may help relax tight muscles. This can help decrease tightness surrounding the sciatic nerve, which may help reduce some of your pain.
Medications such as nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), muscle relaxants, or nerve-pain medications can also be helpful.
Performing corrective or therapeutic exercises may also help reduce your symptoms.Sciatic nerve glidescan help reduce tension along your sciatic nerve while low-back exercises that move your spine into forward or backward bending may help reduce nerve compression depending on the underlying cause.
Advanced sciatica, however, is often not very responsive to conservative treatment methods. If sciatica symptoms last more than 12 months, more involved treatment like injections or surgery may be needed to address symptoms effectively.
Chronic sciatica can heal only if the underlying cause can be effectively treated. Chronic sciatica that lasts more than 12 months often results from spinal conditions such as herniated discs or spinal stenosis of the lumbar spine. These conditions narrow the available space around the nerve roots that exit from the spinal cord and merge to form the sciatica nerve.
When these conditions progress substantially, surgery is often performed to create more space in the spine through a discectomy, laminectomy, foraminotomy, or spinal fusion.
Sometimes sciatica is due to less common causes such as a tumor or an infection of the spine. In these cases, symptoms will not resolve until the underlying cause is treated. Tumors may need to be surgically removed while infections require aggressive antibiotic treatment to prevent spreading to other parts of the body.
Seeing a Pain Specialist to Form a Plan
You should seek immediate medical attention if you have:
These are signs of a medical emergency and require urgent treatment.
Summary
Sciatica is a commonly occurring condition that results from compression of the sciatic nerve in the lower back or leg. Chronic sciatica occurs when symptoms last for 12 months or longer, which can include leg pain, numbness, tingling, weakness, and instability. When pain and other symptoms significantly impact your daily activities and ability to walk, seeing a healthcare provider to address your issues is needed.
For many cases of long-term sciatica, surgery is needed to create more space in the spine to reduce nerve compression from conditions like herniated discs and spinal stenosis.
7 SourcesVerywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Aguilar-Shea AL, Gallardo-Mayo C, Sanz-González R, Paredes I.Sciatica. Management for family physicians.J Family Med Prim Care.2022 Aug;11(8):4174-4179. doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_1061_21.Bosma JW, Wijntjes J, Hilgevoord TA, Veenstra J. Severe isolated sciatic neuropathy due to a modified lotus position.World J Clin Cases.2014 Feb 16;2(2):39-41. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v2.i2.39.Dove L, Jones G, Kelsey LA, Cairns MC, Schmid AB.How effective are physiotherapy interventions in treating people with sciatica? A systematic review and meta-analysis.Eur Spine J.2023 Feb;32(2):517-533. doi: 10.1007/s00586-022-07356-y.Mayfield Clinic.Spinal decompression (laminectomy).Golonka W, Raschka C, Harandi VM, Domokos B, Alfredson H, Alfen FM, Spang C.Isolated lumbar extension resistance exercise in limited range of motion for patients with lumbar radiculopathy and disk herniation-Clinical outcome and influencing factors.J Clin Med. 2021 May 30;10(11):2430. doi: 10.3390/jcm10112430.Hospital for Special Surgery.Sciatica.Hospital for Special Surgery.Pain management.
7 Sources
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Aguilar-Shea AL, Gallardo-Mayo C, Sanz-González R, Paredes I.Sciatica. Management for family physicians.J Family Med Prim Care.2022 Aug;11(8):4174-4179. doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_1061_21.Bosma JW, Wijntjes J, Hilgevoord TA, Veenstra J. Severe isolated sciatic neuropathy due to a modified lotus position.World J Clin Cases.2014 Feb 16;2(2):39-41. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v2.i2.39.Dove L, Jones G, Kelsey LA, Cairns MC, Schmid AB.How effective are physiotherapy interventions in treating people with sciatica? A systematic review and meta-analysis.Eur Spine J.2023 Feb;32(2):517-533. doi: 10.1007/s00586-022-07356-y.Mayfield Clinic.Spinal decompression (laminectomy).Golonka W, Raschka C, Harandi VM, Domokos B, Alfredson H, Alfen FM, Spang C.Isolated lumbar extension resistance exercise in limited range of motion for patients with lumbar radiculopathy and disk herniation-Clinical outcome and influencing factors.J Clin Med. 2021 May 30;10(11):2430. doi: 10.3390/jcm10112430.Hospital for Special Surgery.Sciatica.Hospital for Special Surgery.Pain management.
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
Aguilar-Shea AL, Gallardo-Mayo C, Sanz-González R, Paredes I.Sciatica. Management for family physicians.J Family Med Prim Care.2022 Aug;11(8):4174-4179. doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_1061_21.Bosma JW, Wijntjes J, Hilgevoord TA, Veenstra J. Severe isolated sciatic neuropathy due to a modified lotus position.World J Clin Cases.2014 Feb 16;2(2):39-41. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v2.i2.39.Dove L, Jones G, Kelsey LA, Cairns MC, Schmid AB.How effective are physiotherapy interventions in treating people with sciatica? A systematic review and meta-analysis.Eur Spine J.2023 Feb;32(2):517-533. doi: 10.1007/s00586-022-07356-y.Mayfield Clinic.Spinal decompression (laminectomy).Golonka W, Raschka C, Harandi VM, Domokos B, Alfredson H, Alfen FM, Spang C.Isolated lumbar extension resistance exercise in limited range of motion for patients with lumbar radiculopathy and disk herniation-Clinical outcome and influencing factors.J Clin Med. 2021 May 30;10(11):2430. doi: 10.3390/jcm10112430.Hospital for Special Surgery.Sciatica.Hospital for Special Surgery.Pain management.
Aguilar-Shea AL, Gallardo-Mayo C, Sanz-González R, Paredes I.Sciatica. Management for family physicians.J Family Med Prim Care.2022 Aug;11(8):4174-4179. doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_1061_21.
Bosma JW, Wijntjes J, Hilgevoord TA, Veenstra J. Severe isolated sciatic neuropathy due to a modified lotus position.World J Clin Cases.2014 Feb 16;2(2):39-41. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v2.i2.39.
Dove L, Jones G, Kelsey LA, Cairns MC, Schmid AB.How effective are physiotherapy interventions in treating people with sciatica? A systematic review and meta-analysis.Eur Spine J.2023 Feb;32(2):517-533. doi: 10.1007/s00586-022-07356-y.
Mayfield Clinic.Spinal decompression (laminectomy).
Golonka W, Raschka C, Harandi VM, Domokos B, Alfredson H, Alfen FM, Spang C.Isolated lumbar extension resistance exercise in limited range of motion for patients with lumbar radiculopathy and disk herniation-Clinical outcome and influencing factors.J Clin Med. 2021 May 30;10(11):2430. doi: 10.3390/jcm10112430.
Hospital for Special Surgery.Sciatica.
Hospital for Special Surgery.Pain management.
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