Spinal Facet Disease

Your spine isn’t just made up of discs and bones, it also has little joints in the back called facet joints. These joints act like hinges, helping you bend, twist, and move smoothly. They’re covered in cartilage and surrounded by fluid, kind of like the joints in your knee or fingers.

When you develop facet disease, it means those joints have started to wear down, usually from aging, repeated stress, arthritis, or injury. The cartilage gets thinner, the joints get irritated, and sometimes little bone spurs form. All of this can cause:

·  A stiff, achy back or neck (especially in the morning or after sitting too long)

·  Pain that feels worse when you lean backward or twist

·  Muscle tightness or spasms around the sore joints

·  In some cases, the pain can radiate if a nerve gets irritated nearby

Doctors usually figure it out with a physical exam, scans like an MRI or CT, or sometimes by doing a test injection into the joint to see if that’s really the source of pain.

Treatment usually starts simple:

·  Physical therapy to strengthen and take pressure off the joints

·  Anti-inflammatory meds for flare-ups

·  Injections directly into the joints if the pain keeps coming back

·  For longer-lasting relief, some people benefit from laser or radiofrequency ablation (using heat to “turn off” pain signals)

·  Surgery is rare but can be an option if nothing else helps