A pinched nerve is not really one thing. It is a symptom. Something presses on a nerve and the nerve complains. Tingling. Numbness. A shock that runs down an arm or a leg. Or a patch of skin that fell asleep and never quite woke back up.
The pressure is real. The cause is the part that moves around. Could be a disc. A bone spur. A muscle that will not let go. A joint that quit moving. Pinched nerve symptoms vary, but the evaluation process at Glendale Chiropractic always goes after the cause before anything else. Dr. Brockway evaluates first. No adjustment until he knows what he is dealing with. Patients who come in early tend to respond faster to chiropractic treatment.
Think of where nerves run. Out from the spinal cord, through narrow gaps between the bones. Squeeze one of those gaps, or let nearby tissue swell into it, and the nerve gets pinned. Nerve compression garbles the signal. What you feel is some mix of the following symptoms.
Pins and needles. Tingling that will not quit. A numb patch, oddly specific, one strip of skin and not the rest. Pain that burns or stabs and travels. Weakness somewhere downstream, a hand, a foot. That dead, asleep feeling in a limb.
Here is what patients miss. The symptom says a nerve is involved. It says nothing about why. The why is the whole ballgame for treatment.
Neck first. Pinch a nerve up there and it fires down the shoulder, the arm, into the hand, sometimes out to the fingers. Cervical radiculopathy, technically. If your trouble lives mostly in the neck and arm, that is its own conversation. More on our neck pain page.
Mid-back is rarer. The thoracic spine rides behind the chest. So a pinched nerve here can wrap the ribs or reach into the chest wall, and it fools people into thinking it is something else entirely. One more reason to evaluate carefully before starting any treatment.
Low back is the common one. Press a lumbar nerve root and the pain runs into the buttock, the hip, down the leg, now and then all the way to the foot. Follows the leg like that? Most patients call it sciatica. Chiropractic care for this type of nerve compression is one of the most common treatments we provide.
Symptoms range from mild to severe. The most common ones we see at our Denver clinic include numbness or tingling in the arms or legs, burning or sharp pain along a nerve pathway, muscle weakness in the affected limb, and a persistent feeling that a hand or foot has fallen asleep. Recognizing these symptoms early matters, the sooner patients seek pinched nerve treatment, the better the outcome tends to be.
Two people, same tingling hand, completely different care. Source decides it. Here are the usual suspects.
Disc trouble. A bulging or herniated disc tops the list. It leans on the nerve root, and if it has torn it adds chemical irritation on top. Its own problem, its own approach to treatment.
Wear and tear. Years of it. Bone spurs and narrowing crowd the spaces the nerves pass through. Builds slow. Common past a certain age. Still responds to conservative chiropractic treatment most of the time.
Muscle and posture. Sometimes nothing bony is involved at all. Tight muscle, a body held in one position for hours, soft tissue load. How you sit and stand pours straight into it. Adjusting posture is part of the treatment plan for many patients in this category.
Or something further out. Not every nerve issue begins at the spine. Burning feet, numb toes, the nerve trouble that rides along with diabetes, that one points toward neuropathy. Different animal. A nerve pinched at the wrist, different again.
Dr. Brockway sorts this at the evaluation. No X-rays or MRIs in-office at Glendale Chiropractic. Got imaging already? Bring it. If not, he tells you straight whether you need it and where to go.
Most pinched nerves earn a chiropractic evaluation. A few do not. A few are an emergency. Skip the chiropractor and get seen now if you have any of these symptoms.
Bladder or bowel control slipping. Numbness settling into the groin or inner thighs. Weakness racing down a limb, or down both legs at once.
Rare, all of it. But it goes first because it has to. Everything else, the tingling, the numb patch, the ache that wanders, that is worth an evaluation. For a plain overview of what radiculopathy is and how it usually behaves, Cedars-Sinai has a clear patient guide
The goal states easily. Pressure off the nerve. Joint moving again. Calm the muscle that has been bracing since day one.
The how depends on the cause. Disc pressing a lumbar nerve? Traction therapy earns its keep. The Traction Therapy (Invertrac) works a gentle decompressive pull along the spine, drops the pressure inside the disc, coaxes the bulging material back toward center. This therapy directly addresses nerve compression by reducing disc pressure. Joint locked up instead? A chiropractic adjustment frees the motion and lifts mechanical load off the root. Posture and muscle running the show? The treatment plan leans that way.
Chiropractic care for pinched nerves is non-invasive and does not rely on medication. Most patients experience meaningful pain relief within a few weeks of consistent treatment. Therapy progresses based on how the nerve responds, adjustments, traction therapy, soft tissue work, and postural correction are the main tools.
Upfront about it. Not every pinched nerve is a chiropractic case. The evaluation is what tells us. When it does fit, the aim is lasting relief, getting at what actually presses on the nerve, not muffling the symptom for an afternoon.
First appointment, about 30 minutes. Evaluation first. No adjustment until Dr. Brockway knows the cause.
Timeline depends on cause and on how long it has dragged on. Mild compression, a few days of therapy. Moderate nerve compression tends to ease over four to twelve weeks if the treatment stays steady and patients follow through between appointments. Structural causes, or a nerve squeezed for ages, run longer.
It will not be a straight line. Good days, then a backslide, especially early on. Normal. Not a sign anything is failing. But if weeks pass with no improvement, or weakness or numbness keeps deepening, that is when a specialist enters. Dr. Brockway will tell you so plainly if that is the road you are on.
Rough rule. Not eased in a week or two? Keeps circling back to the same spot? That is your signal. Pinched nerves that keep returning usually mean a cause nobody has dealt with yet.
As your pinched nerve chiropractor Denver patients trust, Dr. Brockway will give you a straight answer on what is happening and what comes next. Schedule your appointment at Glendale Chiropractic today.
Call 720-889-1659 to book your appointment. First visit runs about 30 minutes. You will walk out knowing what you are dealing with.
Glendale Chiropractic 425 S. Cherry St., Suite 307, Denver, CO 720-889-1659 Monday–Thursday, 9:00 AM–12:30 PM and 2:30–6:00 PM. Closed Friday–Sunday. Rated 4.80 stars across 148 reviews.
We accept most major insurance plans. See the full list of insurance we accept.
