Understanding Sciatic Nerve Pain: How to Get Sciatica Pain Relief

Estimated  minute read

What is Sciatica?

Sciatic pain is a common condition that we see here at REP physio in Edmonton. Sciatica can cause pain in the low back pain and is accompanied by electric feeling or burning feeling pain that travels down the leg and sometimes down to the feet. Often times, people with sciatica are unsure how they should approach finding ways to relieve sciatica pain. The good news however, is that the prognosis for sciatic pain is quite good. In mild cases, pain often doesn’t last for longer than 6 weeks, and in 80-90% of the cases, people do not need surgery to address the pain. Here at REP Physio, we are well-versed in seeing people with sciatic pain, and can help you find ways to ease sciatica pain and provide strategies for more longer term pain relief.

The Role of the Sciatic Nerve in Sciatica Pain

The sciatic nerve is the longest and thickest nerve in your body. It starts just outside your lower spine and runs from your lower back all the way down the back side of your leg down into the heel of your foot. The sciatic nerve is a very important nerve in our lower body as it supplies the muscular function and sensation or feeling in various parts of our legs. At the back of the knee, the sciatic nerve splits into 2 different branches, the tibial nerve and the peroneal nerves which supply the muscular and sensory aspects of the back and sides of your calves respectively. Sciatica is when there is pressure on the sciatic nerve. How this may present can vary but the most common presentation is low back pain along with sharp, shooting pain down the back of one leg, down the buttock and into the calf and feet. For some people, they may describe this as an electric feeling pain, and for others it might be a burning sensation. It can also be accompanied by weakness in the muscles of your thigh and calf on the affected side as well as impaired gait and reflexes.

Causes of Sciatica Pain: From Herniated Discs to Compression

There are many reasons why you may be experiencing sciatica. As the sciatic nerve runs from the lower back down your leg, some common reasons why you might experience sciatica include issues with the lower back. We will briefly go over some of these issues in more detail.

  • Herniated disc: A herniated disc is when there is a problem with the jelly-like structure that sits between the bones that stack together to form the spine. A herniated disc is when the jelly-like structure ruptures and pushes out past where it should. This can be one of the reasons you may be experiencing sciatic pain as this can put pressure onto the sciatic nerve. Common symptoms are severe pain in your lower back that radiates down your leg, pain with range of motion of your lower back, particularly bending forward and decreased function and strength in your lower back.
  • Lumbar stenosis: Lumbar stenosis is when there is a narrowing of the spinal canal where the spinal cord runs, and this can put pressure onto the sciatic nerve and nerve roots in your back to produce sciatica symptoms. Unlike a herniated disc, pain is generally worse with your back straight and better when you bend your back. People dealing with lumbar stenosis often find sitting a more comfortable position, and pain is aggravated by standing up and walking. Pain into your lower back and hips is very common.

Besides problems in the lower back, another reasons that can cause sciatica can include issues in the muscles of the hip. One of these conditions is called piriformis syndrome. Piriformis syndrome is when the piriformis, one of the deep muscles in your hip compresses the sciatic nerve, which can cause symptoms like numbness, pain and weakness into the lower back, hips and leg. This can occur due to multiple reasons. Usually, this occurs due to some sort of trauma to the hip, causing inflammation to the soft tissue in the hip and glute area. This swelling of the musculature can be the cause of these symptoms. Other reasons can include pelvic injuries or a pelvic fracture and a tumor that presses on the sciatic nerve.

How to Treat Sciatica: Advice and Exercises for Finding Pain Relief?

Sciatica can be very debilitating, and finding sciatic pain relief can feel very frustrating. The good news is that as mentioned before, the prognosis for sciatica is in general very positive. 80-90% of people who experience sciatica have a resolution of symptoms without needing surgery, with most cases resolving within 6 weeks.

Here are some different strategies you can employ to reduce pain from sciatica.

  • Modifying activities to limit aggravating activities
    • Usually, one of the main things that make sciatica pain worse is lumbar flexion or bending of the back. Some common activities that this happens are sitting as well as bending over to pick something up.
      • There are a few ways you can ease the pain when you sit. One way is to adjust your seat so that you have your back right up against the backrest, keeping your back straight and supported. Another is to sit in a way that creates a more open hip angle. By doing one or both of these strategies, it should reduce how much lumbar flexion you experience while sitting. Another strategy you can implement is to change positions frequently. Making sure you stand up and go for a little bit of a walk when you find you are sitting too long can help with sciatica as well. An easy way to implement this is to think about only trying to sit for 15-20 minutes at a time if possible.
      • Pain caused by sciatica is often aggravated by bending over and picking objects off the floor. This will often cause pain in your back and affected leg. Employing techniques that modify how you pick things up off the ground like bending your knees more or pushing your hips further back can be a good way to compensate for a decreased ability to bend at the lower back. These are strategies we can teach you at REP Physio!
  • Finding comfortable resting positions
    • Often times, people with sciatica usually find difficulties getting comfortable when trying to sleep. Sleep is critical for recovery and pain from sciatica can make it difficult to sleep which creates a vicious cycle where it is difficult to find ways to rest and recover. If this is you, here are a couple positions to trial that will hopefully help ease some of the pain you are dealing with when trying to sleep.
      • When lying on your back, placing a bolster or just stacking some pillows so that your knees are bent and elevated is an effective way in taking pressure off of your back and sciatic nerve.
      • When lying on your side, consider lying on the side that is less painful, and having some bend in your knee as well as placing a pillow in between your legs.
  • Regular physical activity and exercise
    • When dealing with lower back pain and sciatica, a common thought that many people have is that their back needs rest. However, regular physical activity is very important in helping to reduce sciatica pain. This might include simple activities like walking and swimming, provided these do not further aggravate your pain in a significant way.
    • There are many different exercises we can do to help with pain from sciatica.
      • Stretches for sciatica pain relief is often something that people dealing with sciatic symptoms asks for. These stretching exercises can include gentle lower back stretches as well as hamstring stretches to help your body get used to movement in these areas without causing pain. As your tolerance increases, these stretches can be pushed deeper and can be a very effective way to provide some relief to sciatic back pain.
      • Core strengthening is an important component of lower back pain rehabilitation, and can helps reduce sciatica pain. A strong core helps to support your back, so that it can operate properly. Some examples of some core exercises to help relieve and decrease pain in the lower back are deadbugs, planks, birddogs.

Integrating Physical Therapy to Relieve and Treat Sciatica

Why should you come to physiotherapy for your low back pain and sciatica?

Physical therapy can be very helpful in your journey with dealing with sciatic nerve pain and we can help provide you strategies to hopefully reduce pain and prevent future flare ups! We will go over a brief outline of what you can expect when you come see a physical therapist here at REP Physio and what an assessment will entail.

An assessment will a few different items, the main goal of the assessment is to get a better understanding of your symptoms and pain. This will involve a comprehensive subjective and objective assessment where we will ask you a series of questions to better understand your sciatica pain and other symptoms you may be experiencing. This will be followed up with an assessment of how you move, which will include testing lower back, hip and knee range of motion, strength, sensation, and finding pain-provoking positions. The treatment plan will depend on what we find in the assessment, there are many different treatment options that can be employed, but these are some key characteristics that you can expect in any treatment plan you receive here at REP Physio.

1) A strong emphasis on education: We understand how frustrating and debilitating dealing with sciatica can be, and we want to make sure you have a good understanding of what is going on. Based off of our subjective history and objective assessment, we will have a good idea of why you are dealing with your pain and identify the structures that may be affected that might be contributing to your pain. By having you learn more about sciatica, we hope to empower you to feel that you have control over how to improve your symptoms. This is also where we will provide you with how physiotherapy can be helpful in the management of these issues and outline a general path towards how we get you back to feeling better. We will also provide you with education on pain management strategies you can employ at home to help relieve the pain that you are dealing with.

2) Implementing therapeutic exercise: Exercise is a cornerstone of any effective rehabilitation program. Here at REP Physio, we believe that taking an active approach to rehabilitation is very important. We have discussed these earlier in the article, but the importance of staying active and performing exercises to help strengthen the core and back as well as stretches to improve range and tolerance cannot be stressed enough. Exercises can help with all of these qualities as well as provide you confidence that you can play an active role in your rehabilitation. Exercise and an active lifestyle is an excellent way to manage pain as well as bulletproof you from future flare ups.

3) Pain modulators: Here at REP Physio, we stress the importance of an active approach, but modifying symptoms and helping you in relieving sciatic nerve pain is also very important. When dealing with sciatic pain, you may find that you feel very limited in how you are able to move. We employ different manual therapy techniques such as active relief therapy and intramuscular dry needling to help reduce tension in the muscles of your back as well as hopefully helping you get relief from sciatica. Another strategy that you can employ at home that you may find helps relieve sciatica pain is hot and cold therapy. Heating pads and cold packs are tools you can utilize as pain relievers at home to ease sciatic pain. You may find that one is more useful than the other, but in general, applying either for 15 to 20 minutes at a time can be a useful way to provide short term pain relief at home.

You may also like

Back Pain During Pregnancy: Causes, Relief Tips, and Care Instructions

Back Pain During Pregnancy: Causes, Relief Tips, and Care Instructions

Motor Vehicle Accident Pain: Understanding Common Injuries, When to Seek Medical Attention and Treatment Strategies

Motor Vehicle Accident Pain: Understanding Common Injuries, When to Seek Medical Attention and Treatment Strategies

Pain between shoulder blades? Understanding upper back pain.

Pain between shoulder blades? Understanding upper back pain.

Muscle pain after a car accident: your body is stiff

Muscle pain after a car accident: your body is stiff

Believe in yourself

Recovery looks good on you

On your mark. Get set. Recover.