Chronic Thoracic Pain

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solonok29

Hi all,

First of all a big support to everyone suffering with the chronic pain, it is good to know that you are not alone as it can hit you hard that even the strongest can go down on the knees.

I know none of us are medical experts but I am sure you feel that after visiting number of doctors close to a 3 digit figure you start to feel that you know more that the next doctor can tell you.

I have been struggling with the upper back chronic main, it has started one day and almost 3.5 years I have been still searching for solutions.

It would be great if anyone can share their 'little' victories and hopefully I can share something that I managed to work out myself

I did 3 MRIs and the latest showed a bit of protrusions at T8. My pain is constant when I sit/stand and eased off when I lay down. I use a lot of heat which helps with the spasms

I tired probably all chiro, physio and osteopath within 30 miles radius and every new one promising me a quick miracle.

I work hybrid and my home office looks like a professional gym with every single piece of equipment you can think of from medical balls, to pull up bars, yoga mats etc.

My office both home and work were professionally examined by the ergonomic specialists.

I do sit a lot as I work in IT but only during the working days (standard 36 hours working week) and I try to do a regular lunch walk and small exercises/stretches in between.

Here is what I find with Thoracic pain

1. NHS / UK healthcare works as follows. GP focus on pain management with painkillers and muscle relaxans. There is not much the can offer
2. The standard starting point is MSK. Most MRIs does not show the true source of pain. For example mine did not show any problems at throstic and I am sure there are people with 6mm hernia without any pain.
3. The next step is a pain management. Expect queues between your appointments at least 7-12 months. There is little they can offer.
4. If you use physio expect a clear path and hands on I cluded in your price. Most physio/osteopath tend to just give you some pdfs with exercises and expect you to pay £40-70 per quick session. I now give new professional 3 session to see if they make any progress.
5. Stress and depression arrives quickly so these are your worst enemy
6. Dont expect relatives/spouse/close friends to understand the chronic pain.
7. With most back pains 95% will be required from you to work hard on yourself mentally and physically with a good specialist guiding you. Don't expect a quick solution or a long term relief.
8. You will get some sort of anxiety and worrying on making your back pain worse. Make notes as it's some times hard to work out if specific movements / exercises need to be altered / excluded. It is easy to get yourself in a trap ie I worked in the garden for 1 hour now I am in pain, I will never work in the garden from today etc

Also I found thoracic pain especially with disks etc is very rare so doctors more familiar with low back treatments.

While I am continuing working on cha gong the live style and finding the soft tissue/exercise solution, I am getting to the point where I may accept that the exercises may not help.

I wonder if anyone had any success with injections? I am waiting with NHS for a medical branch block which is essentially a test to work out if facet is causing the issue but docs tend to avoid injections in upper back area due as it is close to lungs.

Feel free to share your stories and any strategies that helped.

Someone told me once "You may never go back 100% but you may get 5 % improvements which will reduce you symptoms by 50%> I like this statement

chiarieds

Hi @solonok29 - & welcome to the forum. I can agree with much that you're saying. Many of us feel that we know our own bodies the best, & yes, you become your own expert. However we have to rely upon the medical profession for appropriate tests & any diagnoses.

I often say that if you could get all of your 'specialists' in one room discussing your problems that 'might' be a way forward. The trouble with such specialists is that they know an enormous amount about their own speciality, but seem unable to see beyond that.

You are correct, & I haven't found out that the medical profession know why, but you can have severe disc protrusion & hardly have any pain; conversely you can have minimal protrusion & be in agony. It is sort of natural that a person's pain increases when weight bearing, & eases off when lying down.

The pathway you describe about thoracic pain is very similar to anyone with back pain (& yes, the lower back is often more problematic), & also similar to some experiencing 'chronic pain' that's musculo-skeletal in origin.

There we 'might' digress. I'll confess that I'm a long-retired physio, & physiotherapy can often help. I'm with you there tho that just having a pdf to 'help' doesn't always. Things have changed, & not always for the better. My neighbour had a total knee replacement last week; he briefly saw a physio in hospital & was sent home with a booklet about appropriate exercises. He asked me to see how he was doing on Monday. Oof, he wasn't doing most of his exercises correctly, but I was hopefully able to help. He's determined, & a positive outlook always helps, but not being shown how to do the exercises correctly in the first place dismayed me.

I have told him that it's far better to do a little & often, & only increase his exercises as & when he can, as an increase in pain is counterproductive.

Now I will positively disagree, exercise can help, & it might not always be the first thing you'd think about, but simply learning to breathe correctly can help. Diaphragmatic or abdominal breathing can reduce both stress & pain. Please try:

https://www.cheshire-epaige.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Diaphragmatic-breathing-techniques.pdf This works whether lying down, sitting or standing.

I'm pleased you're exploring different modalities, as, with chronic pain it's often found that a combination of these proves the more helpful. Perhaps you might look here about chronic pain as you're doing much to help yourself already (I also suffer from daily chronic pain incidentally):

https://forum.scope.org.uk/discussion/102784/resources-and-tips-for-those-living-with-chronic-pain