Bone Spur & Physical Therapy

When a bone repeatedly rubs against a ligament, tendon or another bone, a bone spur may form. Although these bony growths can be painful and limit joint movements, they also can exist for years without causing pain or problems. Bone spurs often occur in conjunction with osteoarthritis, which results when the cartilage protecting a joint breaks down.

What the Doctors Can Do

• A doctor may know from symptoms alone whether a person has a bone spur, or he might order tests. X-rays are a common way to look for bone spurs. CT and MRI scans also might be used, according to the Mayo Clinic. A doctor might suggest anti-inflammatory drugs to reduce pain, or a surgeon might operate to cut away the spur.

Other treatments

• Few studies have been published about non-surgical treatment of bone spurs, which often form on the heel, where they can be very painful, and the spine, where they might press on nerves and cause numbness and pain.

  One article on heel pain reviewed studies of a variety of non-surgical approaches. Authors F. Crawford and C. Thomson looked at research on steroid injection, shock wave therapy, night splints, and shoe inserts vs. stretching in their article "Interventions for treating plantar heel pain (Review)," published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews in 2003. Steroid injections brought some pain relief. A therapy using shock waves, although evidently painful in itself, produced mild pain relief in one study. Night splints, braces that help prevent calf muscles from tightening during sleep, appeared effective in one study but not in another, according to Crawford and Thomson. Stretching exercises worked better than ready-made shoe inserts, according to another study in their review.

  A study published in 2000 in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine found that injecting growth hormone helped patients with osteoarthritic finger joints, whose movement can be hindered by bone spurs.

  In treating bone spurs of the spine, Black Hills Neurosurgery & Spine, in South Dakota, suggests weight loss, stretching, physical therapy, rest and ice. This medical group suggests surgery only in "serious cases of damage and deformity."

Prevention

• In fact, many studies point to the effectiveness of physical therapy and some exercise activities, such as yoga, in reducing pain from osteoarthritis. Given the association of bone spurs and osteoarthritis, this might be where exercise interventions might serve best in prevention of bone spurs.