Back pain?

[twinkly29]

Does anyone suffer with back pain linked to asthma? I have severe/brittle asthma and have just got home yesterday from another admission. Today my back (across my upper back, kind of where my hand would be if I put it flat under my bra band, for want of a better description) really aches. Googling seems to suggest lung pain would be top front of chest or shoulder blades and worse on breathing. This feels like my lungs are tired but I know pain is often felt in other places to where we think. But I don't know what else it could be.

[EmmaF91 Community Ambassador]

Hi - sorry to hear that you’ve just got out but hopefully you’re feeling a little better!

The back pain is most likely a side effect from your muscles working overtime to breathe and irritating the joints there too, rather than a pain from your actual lungs. That area is a commonly ‘irritated’ area in people (not just those with resp issues). Uncomfortable hospital beds don’t help either tho 😒!

Personally I find osteopathy (promoting my profession here!) can really help with these kinds of aches and pains! Heat (a hot water bottle/wheat bag) will probably also help relax it a bit too.

Hope that helps and that you feel better soon

[twinkly29 in reply to EmmaF91]

Thank you x

[hypercat54 in reply to EmmaF91]

Great reply Emma. You really are very knowledgeable x

[johnsmith]

See a McTimony chiropractor. They should be able to answer the questions you have. They may be able to reduce your breathing problems.

Chiropractors treating asthma! There are plenty of Asthma specialists who will say chiropractors cannot treat asthma. However, Asthma specialists have a tendency to know very little how muscles function. And tend to lack the ability to understand the breathing mechanism as an engineering system with feedback mechanisms which have an influence on how easy or difficult breathing can be made by how tight certain muscles are.

Hope I have been able to be helpful.

[EmmaF91 Community Ambassador in reply to johnsmith]

Ok - professional thing here. Chiropractors, like osteopaths cannot treat asthma. We can treat the side effects of asthma (muscle changes/soreness, joint pain, breathing dysfunctions, increased SNS activity, nerve facilitation etc) but we cannot actually treat asthma!

If you’re having an asthma attack you cannot go to an complimentary or alternative medicine looking for a fix, you need to go to hospital. We cannot stop attacks from ever happening you need to take your prescribed medicines.

Some people may find that it helps to reduce incidences of attack/symptoms but that is anecdotal and individual to the patient and their problems. This may eventually lead to a ‘downgrade’ of their asthma and drugs, however not everyone gets this. Personally, as a severe asthmatic, I find it helps with the residual aches and pains from attacks/admissions but at most it ‘postpones’ an attack by a day or so if I feel it building (played around a lot with it at uni, treated different ways and in different timeframes and different levels of ‘twitchy‘ lungs).

As a registered osteopath I can be struck off for saying that I can treat asthma as it’s unproven and potentially dangerous to the patient if they stop talking meds cause I’ve ‘cured’ them.

I’m sorry, but I’m all for people trying things out to see if it helps, including chiropractors, acupuncture and anything else you can think of, because some may feel a benefit, however you can’t tell people that you treat asthma!

[twinkly29 in reply to EmmaF91]

Thanks Emma. Yes I totally get what you're saying. And someone who's not a doctor proclaiming to treat asthma itself wouldn't impress me!

[hypercat54 in reply to EmmaF91]

Emma can I pm you about the osteopath bit please? x

[johnsmith in reply to EmmaF91]

Thanks for the reply. There is always a problem with wording and the meaning of phrases among the different peer groups. I would never say that a complementary therapist can cure asthma.

The meaning of words is always problematic. "Treat" to me means help with symptoms. "Treat" to yourself means to cure the disease. Which is a different meaning to what I intended. You have spelt out quite nicely the reduction in symptoms of asthma that can occur which can make a huge difference in the quality of life for an asthma sufferer.

You say: "Some people may find that it helps to reduce incidences of attack/symptoms but that is anecdotal and individual to the patient and their problems."

All treatments are anecdotal and individual to the patient. One of the biggest myths around is evidence based trials. The trial may be evidence based. But where on the population curve of treatment response does the patient lie. Many consultants do not check this issue.

There is something called "stress breakdown point in engineering systems." The breathing system is an engineering system and by feedback mechanisms interacts with other systems. When the breathing system experiences stress just below the stress breakdown point it functions albeit with difficulty. Just above the stress breakdown point the smallest increase in stress will cause the system to fail in totally unpredictable ways.

Many complementary therapeutic treatments help reduce stresses below the stress break down point so that the system does not fail in unpredictable ways with slight increases in stress. It is an unfortunate fact of life that engineering systems and the way they function is totally alien to the thinking of many medical consultants. Feedback mechanisms are understood by engineers, Unfortunately, many medical consultants do not understand feedback mechanisms in systems and the interaction between systems.

Your profession has a particular definition of the word "treat". For the record I have taught people how to handle an asthma attack and what I have taught has been effective. I would never think for an instant that what I have taught would cure their asthma. What I taught was a tool to use to help reduce problematic symptoms.