Spinal Cord Stimulation

Spinal Cord Stimulation services offered in San Antonio, TX

Spinal cord stimulation provides substantial pain relief by blocking pain signals traveling through nerves in the spinal cord. As pain management specialists, the board-certified physicians at Advanced Spine and Pain Center have extensive experience with spinal cord stimulation, including one of its latest advances, dorsal root ganglion (DRG) spinal cord stimulation. To learn how this treatment can relieve your pain even if other medical therapies have failed, call one of the three offices in San Antonio, Texas, or book an appointment online today.

Spinal Cord Stimulation Q & A

What is spinal cord stimulation?

Spinal cord stimulation uses mild electrical impulses to stop pain signals from traveling through specific spinal nerves. Sending electrical impulses into the nerve stops the pain message. As a result, your brain doesn’t know about the pain, and your pain improves.

How does spinal cord stimulation work?

Spinal cord stimulators consist of a small pulse generator, insulated lead wires (with electrodes on one end), and a controller. Your provider uses a needle-like device to guide the lead wires along your spinal cord, placing the electrodes next to the targeted spinal nerves.

For the next step, your provider implants the generator under your skin, usually near your buttocks or abdomen. After connecting the lead wires to the generator, they use the controller to program the generator, and it sends electrical pulses through the wires to the spinal nerves. You keep the controller and use it to turn the device on and off.

What types of pain does spinal cord stimulation relieve?

Since spinal cord stimulation blocks nerve signals at the spinal cord, it has the potential to stop pain messages from arriving from anywhere in your body. Advanced Spine and Pain Center primarily recommends spinal cord stimulation to ease pain caused by:

Failed back surgery syndrome
Complex regional pain syndrome
Diabetic neuropathy
Lower back pain (when surgery isn’t an option)

The device can stay in place indefinitely if you have a spinal cord stimulator implanted for any of these conditions.

What is the spinal cord stimulator trial?

During the trial, your provider inserts the wires, and you wear the generator outside your body. After using the device for about a week, you will know if it gives you enough pain relief to have the pulse generator implanted. If you don’t want the device, your provider removes the wires.

What is dorsal root ganglion (DRG) spinal cord stimulation?

DRG spinal cord stimulation targets groups of nerves (dorsal root ganglia) at each vertebra. Sensory nerves carrying pain information from your body meet at the dorsal root ganglia and then continue into the spinal canal and up to your brain.

This treatment blocks all the nerves in the ganglia, giving you pain relief for a specific body area. DRG spinal cord stimulation works well for people with localized lower extremity pain.

Call the nearest Advanced Spine and Pain Center office or book online today to learn more about spinal cord stimulation.