Back Pain

Back pain is one of the most common reasons people visit a chiropractor — and one of the most common results of auto accidents and sports injuries. It can stem from a variety of sources including misaligned vertebrae, damaged discs, strained muscles, or compressed nerves. Our job is to identify the exact cause through thorough examination and create a targeted treatment plan that addresses the root problem, not just the symptoms.

Most back pain doesn't start with one dramatic moment. You bend down for a laundry basket, or you climb out of the car after a slow crawl up I-35, and something in your low back locks up. Sometimes there's a story behind it, a weekend of yard work or a move or a step off a ladder that landed wrong. Just as often there's no story at all, and the ache crept in over a few weeks of long hours at a desk until you noticed you were bracing yourself to stand up. What we hear at the front desk tends to sound the same either way. You waited a while. You tried heat, then ice, then a friend's foam roller. It got better, then it came back. By the time most people call us, they're just tired of planning the day around their back.

It helps to have someone look at it, because back pain describes a location rather than a cause. A joint in the low back that has stopped moving well feels different from a muscle that has spent a month guarding a sore spot, and they don't settle with the same things. One stretch will help one and aggravate the other, which is part of why advice from the internet works so unpredictably. So the first visit goes toward working out what you're actually dealing with. A lot of that is simply what you tell us. Pain that eases when you sit and builds the longer you stand points one direction. Pain that's worst in the first hour of the morning and loosens once you move around points somewhere else.

Care here usually combines a few things rather than leaning on one. Adjustments to the joints that aren't moving the way they should, hands-on soft tissue work and muscle stimulation for the muscles around them, and a short set of exercises you do at home so the area is supported between visits. The home part matters more than people expect. A visit or two a week is a small slice of what your back does the rest of the week, and how you lift, sit, and sleep is usually doing most of the talking. We'll be specific about what to change instead of telling you to have better posture and leaving it there. We'll also be straightforward about how many visits make sense. If your back isn't responding the way we'd expect, that's worth saying out loud and rethinking together.

Chicoine Chiropractic has been caring for families on this side of town since 1989, and the office is at 3407 Wells Branch Pkwy, Suite 625, in Wells Branch, North Austin, with parking right at the door. Dr. Shelly Hogan, D.C. and Dr. Nicole Edwards, D.C. are sisters, and they see people from Wells Branch, Pflugerville, and the neighborhoods around Tech Ridge. Rosamaria at the front desk speaks fluent Spanish and can help you from check-in through the visit. Texas doesn't require a referral, so you can book online or call (512) 255-1777. If you're not sure whether what you have is something we handle, say so on the phone and you'll get an honest answer.