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Facet Block Injection

Explanation

Facet joints are known as small joints, they exist at every element of the spine, and they also give stability and help in motion. The facet joints may get painful when it is damaged by arthritis of the spine, a back injury or any mechanical stress to the back. A cervical, thoracic or lumbar facet joint injection contains a less quantity of local anesthetic or steroid medication that can numb the facet joints and help to block the pain. Facet joint injection is produced to help you in order to bear physical therapy without any pain for the rehabilitation of your injury.

Facet joint injections help in diagnosing the main reason behind pain and they are also to provide relief from pain.

The Process is carried out as

The treatment of facet joint injection comparatively simple than other conservative treatments, it is the straightforward treatment and nothing is hidden from you. The treatment is mostly performed at office of your physician or it can be performed at ambulatory surgical center as well.

This procedure includes following steps

  1. Mostly this treatment is performed without giving any sedation to you, however, an IV line can be started if the relaxation medicine is required
  2. You will be asked to lie down on a procedure table, after that the skin of specific area will be checked and cleaned
  3. The physician will use numbing medicine on the small area of skin, and it may prick for a few seconds.
  4. Your physician will use X-ray in order to take a small needle into the facet joints without any trouble
  5. The less amount of contrast dye is entered to verify that needle has gone into the joint accurately and that medication has reached inside the joint.
  6. After this confirmation, aless amount of mixture made by anesthetic (such as lidocaine) and anti-inflammatory medication (steroid/cortisone) is inserted into the joint.

AM I a Candidate?

Those who are suffering from neck, arm, low back or neck pain caused by inflammation are the right candidates for facet injection. Facet injection is also helpful for the joints that got damaged by spinal stenosis, spondyloloysis, sciatica, herniated disc, Arthritis, and postoperative pain.

How long will procedure take?

The procedure does not take more than 30 minutes.

How long will you take to recover?

You can or cannot get a pain relief after few hours of treatment, it varies on whether your pain producing joints have been identified as the main source of your pain or not. If the pain producing joints or joint is not targeted accurately then it indicates that you will not get faster relief from injection.

Its Outcome

After the treatment is performed, the pain will not get back till many months. You will definitely get the pain relief, if facet joints were only the reason behind your pain.