Sciatica pain and treatment

Physiotherapists are skilled in providing effective advice and treatment for people suffering with sciatica pain. Working with you to understand the cause of your pain, our physios will provide tailored advice and programs to help reduce your pain and optimise your recovery. By helping you relieve your symptoms through non-invasive techniques, we can help you return to the activities you love.

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What is sciatica pain?

Sciatica or sciatic pain, refers pain that occurs along the course of the sciatic nerve. It means pain can be felt anywhere from the low back, buttocks and down the back of the leg, extending as far as the foot and toes. Pain is caused by irritation of the sciatic nerve (commonly in the buttock region) or at the nerve roots in the low back which supply the sciatic nerve.

You do not need to have back pain to have sciatica. You can have leg or buttock pain without any back pain at all. Often the pain might also be associated with altered sensation in the legs, tingling and even muscle weakness. Sciatic pain is often aggravated with bending or twisting at the low back, and coughing.

What causes sciatica?

As the sciatic nerve originates from nerve roots in the low back, it is caused by either irritation or compression of these nerve roots or the nerve itself.

At the spinal level, compression or irritation of the nerve roots can occur from inflammation, herniated discs, spinal stenosis and spondylolisthesis. 

At the nerve itself, irritation can occur where it passes through the buttock muscles or down the back of the leg. This may occur from muscle tightness or even direct trauma. 

What are the symptoms of sciatica?

The most common symptom reported is pain with sciatica- but symptoms and presentation will vary.

Often symptoms can include:

• Sharp and radiating pain- travelling from the buttocks and down the back of the leg;
• Tingling or numbness in the leg, ankle or foot;
• Muscle weakness in the leg.

Usually symptoms would be on one side of the body but on rare occasions both legs can be affected. Most symptoms tend to develop over time than reporting a specific incident.

How do you diagnose sciatica?

Your physiotherapist will help diagnosis sciatica pain from your history of symptoms and a physical examination. History taking is important to fully understand your exact symptoms, while you will also be questioned on other symptoms and history to make sure there is nothing else sinister going on. The physical examination and tests includes spinal range of movement, neural mobility and testing, muscle strength testing and sensory testing. This not only helps rule in or rule sciatica pain- but will also determine the cause of your pain and direct the best treatment approach.

Do I need a scan?

The majority of cases do not require scans (ie. Xrays, MRI) for an accurate diagnosis, and most people should recover within 4-8 weeks with targeted treatment. Further investigation may be needed if your therapist needs to rule out other pathology early on, or if symptoms have not settled after 8 weeks of treatment.

What is the best physiotherapy treatment for sciatica?

Research shows conservative management is recommended for most cases of sciatica, however there is not one treatment that has been shown to be superior to others. Our physiotherapists believe in a tailored approach to treatment to ensure you get the best results.

Treatment will generally include education, an exercise plan and hand’s on treatment. A comprehensive treatment plan will not only look to reduce your pain and settle your symptoms, but empower you with strategies to prevent it occurring again.  Typically this may include:

1. Education/Advice. Understanding what you should and shouldn’t be doing in the early stages is important to help your recovery. Our physios help guide people on posture, activity modifications and also provide education on how to also help your symptoms at home (use of heat or ice etc.)

2. Exercise. From the initial assessment, our skilled back physiotherapists will often prescribe an exercise plan which may include neural/nerve mobility stretching, spinal mobility, muscle stretching and strengthening (legs, buttocks, back and core).

3. Hands-on treatment. Often used in the early stages to address your symptoms and improve your movement, our physios may use soft-tissue techniques (ie massage), stretching, joint mobilization, dry needling, or even taping.

ee the best back physios in Glen Iris, Malvern East, Ashburton.

Our sciatica physios are highly skilled in a variety of techniques. Some of the treatments that we offer to help recover from your pain include:

At Sportsfit Physio & Health our Sciatic Physiotherapists have all the tools to ensure you have a full recovery.

READ MORE HERE about how physiotherapy can help different types of back pain.

Our back pain physiotherapists are helping locals of Glen Iris and Malvern East.

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