Sciatica is pain in your buttock and leg. That’s caused by pressure on a spinal nerve in your lower back.
Sciatica
Sciatica refers to pain in your leg that’s cause by a problem in your lower back. That affects the sciatic nerve. The sciatic nerve is a large nerve made up of several spinal nerves that branch from your lower spine in your back through your hips and buttocks and down each leg. If you have sciatica, you usually feel pain along the path of the sciatic nerve, and it usually affects only one side of your body. Sometimes you might also have numbness, tingling or muscle weakness in part of your leg.
Sciatica is more common if you:
- are male
- are 30 to 50 years of age
- drive or sit for more than 2 hours a day
- carry heavy loads at work.
Other minor risk factors include smoking, having a stressful occupation and doing too little or too much physical activity.
Your spine is made up of bones which are called vertebrae, and intervertebral discs (discs for short) that act as cushions between the bones.
The most common cause of sciatica is a prolapsed or herniated disc (also known as a ‘slipped disc’). This is when a disc bulges into 1 or more spinal nerves, or when there is a tear in the outer layer of the disc and the gel-like filling oozes out and irritates a spinal nerve.
Spinal stenosis is another common cause of sciatica. This is related to getting older and slowly gets worse over time. The parts of your spine that the เว็บพนันออนไลน์ UFABET สมัครง่าย โปรโมชั่นมากมาย nerves pass through become narrower, which can irritate or compress 1 or more of your spinal nerves.
Disc herniations and spinal stenosis don’t always cause symptoms. Many people have these conditions and don’t know about it. They’re only a problem if symptoms develop.
Less common causes of sciatica are:
- spondylolisthesis – this is when a vertebra slips out of position and irritates or compresses a nerve root
- a spinal or back injury or infection
- a growth within your spine, such as a tumour
- cauda equina syndrome, a rare but serious condition caused by compressed and damaged nerves in your spinal cord
The most common symptoms of sciatica are:
- shooting, stabbing, electric shock pain which usually starts in your lower back and buttock and runs down one leg past your knee and sometimes into your calf and foot
- numbness, weakness or pins and needles in a part of your buttock, leg and foot
- lower back pain.
If you only have lower back pain, or if the pain in the leg is in a large area, then it’s probably not sciatica.
The most common pattern of pain is down your buttocks and the back of your leg, and into your foot. The pain in your leg is normally worse than the pain in your back or you mightn’t have any back pain at all.
The pain can be mild or severe, and it can start suddenly or gradually. Sneezing, coughing or sitting for a long period of time may make it worse.
See your healthcare provider if you have any of the following
- severe, ongoing or worsening pain
- weakness or difficulty lifting your foot when walking
- bowel or bladder problems, eg, loss of control or incontinence
- fever or other symptoms that are worrying you.