Foraminal Stenosis

Neural Foraminal Narrowing

The most common cause of neural foraminal stenosis is due to disc degeneration. Through the natural ageing process, our discs may become herniated or bulge resulting in a narrow foramen.

When referring to spinal stenosis, the reference is with respect to the narrowing of the spinal column where nerves exit through the neuroforamen. Most often, spinal stenosis is associated with the nerves in the spine becoming compressed due to the narrowing or closing of the neuroforamen.

Left or Right Stenosis

The word foramen is Latin and means a natural hole or an opening or short passage, especially in the body. Most often this hole is found in a bone that a nerve will pass through.

Cervical Foraminal Stenosis

Before you can confirm whether you are indeed suffering from cervical stenosis, you will need to consult a physician.

Thoracic Foraminal Stenosis

For those who suffer from foraminal stenosis, the symptoms are often the same as thoracic spinal stenosis. The difference in thoracic foraminal stenosis is one or more vertebral foramen being affected.

What is Foraminal Stenosis

To best understand foraminal stenosis we should look at spinal stenosis first to get a general understanding of what stenosis is. When translating from Greek language, stenosis is defined as a narrowing of a normally larger opening

Foraminal Stenosis Treatment

Most common back pain conditions are usually treatable through conservative methods, but unlike these other back pain problems conventional treatment methods for foraminal stenosis rarely provide much back pain relief.

Foraminal Stenosis Symptoms

Quite often a patient’s ability to walk will be severely limited and rarely become debilitating to the point that the patient will stop walking. After a five to ten minute period of rest this discomfort will usually subside.

Foraminal Stenosis Surgery

If conservative treatment of foraminal stenosis fails to relieve your back pain symptoms, or if there is progressive weakness or loss of bowel / bladder function surgery may become a viable option for treatment of foraminal stenosis. There are a variety of operations that are available for lumbar spinal stenosis, but they are dependent on the doctor’s findings from examination of a CT or MRI scan.

Foraminal Stenosis and Back Pain Prevention Tips

Our back is a complex structure and because of this there is a multitude of reasons that may contribute and lead to back injuries.