You are probably reading this because you are sitting there with a trapped nerve pain in your body somewhere. The pain of a nerve being trapped can be so sore and painful to even think of moving at times. You may have felt the pain instantly or noticed this nagging ache getting worse throughout the day after waking up this morning.
So what exactly is a trapped nerve? Hopefully you will have a better understanding by the end.
Trapped Nerve Pain
Nerves are all over our bodies. They start from our brain and travel to all our internal organs, out to the fingers and toes and the skin all over our body. Nerves are everywhere in our bodies!
The Types Of Nerves
To start we have two main nervous systems:
- Central Nervous System (CNS)
- Peripheral Nervous System (PNS)
The central nervous system is our brain and spinal cord.
The peripheral nervous system is all the other nerves.
Why is it important to know we have two main nervous systems. Well nerve pain a.k.a neuropathic pain is diagnosed according to which nervous system is being effected.
Probably most people reading this article will fall into the trapped nerve in the peripheral nervous system. This is likely to be you if you right now have a trapped nerve pain in your neck, lower back, leg, arm, elbow, wrist, ankle or foot.
Sometimes you can have a slow progressive degenerative condition affecting the spinal cord as is the case with cervical spondylotic myelopathy or more of a sudden shock like what can happen in a car whiplash accident causing spinal shock.
Symptoms of a Trapped Nerve
So what are some of the trapped nerve symptoms?
You may have a trapped nerve if you:
- Have pain,
- Electric like pain,
- Throbbing pain,
- Boney ache pain,
- Loss of feeling,
- Pins and needles,
- Loss of temperature sensation,
- Low back pain,
- Neck pain
- Changes in the texture of your skin,
- And more…
Symptoms can overlap conditions. To be able to diagnose a trapped nerve condition a healthcare professional would need both a good history taking and physical examination.
Trapped Nerve Tests
A physical examination would include observation of say how your walking, moving or holding your posture. Looking for muscle wasting or skin changes.
Orthopaedic tests are done to stress different tissues in your body like Spurlings Test, Straight Leg Raise, Slump Test, Traction etc…
Neurological examination at a basic would be sensory, motor and reflex checking, babinski reflex, hoffman’s reflex etc…
Advanced testing could be x-rays, MRI scan, CAT scan, blood tests, nerve conduction studies etc…
I know, WOW!
You probably have read this and gone wow so much stuff, but how do I know if I have a trapped nerve?
Well that is why questions need to be asked some physical tests or even some advanced tests may need to be done to rule in or out the question of a trapped nerve pain.
Pain travels along a nerve. If we had no nerves we would feel no pain. But it doesn’t mean it is always a problem with the nerve causing our pains. The reason this is important is so that you can get an accurate diagnosis and the correct treatment to get better as soon as possible.
Have you got some of the symptoms or had some of the positive tests or scans from your doctor telling you that it is a trapped nerve pain? Let me know in a comment below.