Middle Back Pain

Your middle back is considered anywhere between your shoulder blades down to the bottom of your rib cage. If you feel pain above this area, it’s upper back pain, and if the pain is lower, it’s lower back pain. Mid-back pain often hurts with movement, limiting your flexibility.

There are many reasons for mid-back pain right side and mid-back pain left side. But if you’re suffering, you need to seek middle back pain treatment so you can breathe easily again. Visit a back pain specialist to get the best care, including an accurate diagnosis and effective treatment.

Your pain specialist’s goal is to find the exact reason you’re in pain. The cause may be muscular, skeletal, or nerve-related. An accurate diagnosis points your doctor to the most effective mid-back pain treatment. The possible causes of your pain include:

• A pulled muscle, which causes other structures in your back to overcompensate
• A muscle or ligament sprain in your back can be caused when you try to lift something the wrong way
• Arthritis, which often attacks the cartilage of your joints, including the joints of your spine
• Osteoarthritis or facet joint syndrome, which makes it hard to bend without pain
• Osteoporosis, which reduces the density of your bones, usually in people older than 40
• An injury to your spine or ribs that causes immediate pain
• A herniated disc in the middle part of your back
• Spinal stenosis, which squeezes your spinal cord, although this ailment is more common in your upper or lower back

• Shoot up to your neck or around your ribs
• Come and go, depending on your movement
• Hurt more when you breathe deeply, cough or sneeze

You likely feel stiff as well. Because of the pain, you may not want to twist, turn or bend. All the movements you used to take for granted now cause pain. If the pain isn’t severe, you can try rest and stretch, but more often, you’ll have to seek mid-back pain treatment to cure the underlying issue that’s causing your pain.

Middle Back Pain Treatment

To provide relief, your pain specialist may start you out on pain medication. If over-the-counter medicine – such as common non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) – haven’t worked, your physician may have you try stronger treatments, such as:

• Prescription ointments that you apply topically
• Muscle relaxants that are prescription-strength
• Injections that contain a corticosteroid anti-inflammatory medicine, as well as a local anesthetic, including:
  • Epidural steroid injection
  • Nerve block injection
  • Thoracic epidural injection
  • Spine facet injection

The steroid injections kill your pain while working to calm the inflamed area in your spine. Unless the inflammation is the sole cause of your pain, these injections are effective for just two or three months. You can repeat the procedure, but these injections can’t be a long-term solution, as repeated steroid injections are ultimately detrimental to your health.

Managing Your Mid-Back Pain

You have two choices for middle back pain treatment:

1. You can manage your pain while you adjust your lifestyle to fit your new reality.
2. You can deal with the cause of the pain to stop the pain at its source.

Pain management involves not only medication and injections but also stretching, exercise, and physical therapy. All deliver results in reducing pain. Curing the source of your pain may possibly involve surgery. Back surgery, like all surgeries, carries risks, however. Which mid-back pain relief method you choose is up to you and your physician.

Febin Melepura, MD is a top rated, best in class interventional pain management doctor. He is a nationally recognized pain relief specialist and is among the top pain care doctors in New York City and the country. He is an award winning expert and contributor to a prominent media outlets.

Dr. Febin Melepura has been recognized for his thoughtful, thorough, modern approach to treating chronic pain and, among other accolades, has been named a “top pain management doctor in New York”, and one of “America’s Top Doctors™” for an advanced sports injury treatments.