Should you stretch your hamstrings if you have a lumbar disc herniation?
No. If the tightness in your hamstring is coming from a disc, stretching it makes the disc and the nerve worse. Every forward bend loads the front of the disc and pushes the herniation backward into the nerve that is already irritated. That is why the stretch feels good for 30 seconds and you are worse an hour later.
I looked at an MRI recently on a patient who had been stretching for months. His hamstring was tight. His calf was on fire, like a cramp that never let go. On a normal disc, the nerves that run down the leg have a clear path out. On his scan, a large disc herniation was sitting right on those nerves.
He had been told the same thing everyone gets told. Tight hamstring, stretch the hamstring. And he did. And it got worse. Nobody told him the hamstring was never the problem.
Listen, the hamstring is the alarm. The disc is the fire.
Why does sciatica get worse the more you stretch?
Because sciatica from a herniated disc is a pressure problem, not a flexibility problem. You can stretch a tight muscle. You cannot stretch a disc off a nerve. When you flex forward, you add pressure to a disc that is already pushing where it should not be.
Think of the disc like a jelly-filled donut. The annulus is the dough on the outside, the nucleus is the jelly in the middle. When the dough tears, the jelly spits out. If it spits out into the space where the nerve runs, that nerve has nowhere to go.
Now bend forward to touch your toes. You squeeze the front of the donut and the jelly goes backward, straight into the nerve. That is the exact motion of a hamstring stretch. If this is you, you know what I’m talking about. The leg feels tight, you stretch, the next day it is worse.
Here is the patient’s MRI so you can see what a large herniation looks like sitting on the nerve:
What should you avoid with a lumbar disc herniation?
Anything that adds pressure to the disc, and anything that ignores the pressure altogether. Three things top my list: forward-bending hamstring stretches, hanging on an inversion table, and jumping to a cortisone shot or a surgery consult before the compression has ever been addressed.
Number one is the stretching. Toe touches, seated forward folds, pulling your leg up toward your chest with a strap. If you have a confirmed lumbar disc herniation and leg symptoms, stop. You are not fixing a muscle. You are irritating a nerve.
Number two is the inversion table. People buy them because they think they are getting decompression. They are not. You are just hanging. No oscillation, no control over the pressure. That is why you spasm on it and end up worse. Decompression tables are Ferraris. Incredible machines. But you have to know how to drive stick or you crash it. An inversion table is not even in the same garage.
Number three is the conveyor belt. Online physical therapy, then the injection, then the injection wears off, then the surgery waitlist. A cortisone shot is a chemical solution for a physical problem. It can quiet the nerve for a while, but the jelly is still out. Surgery takes the jelly out but never fixes the pressure either. About 25% of the patients in my program have already had spinal surgery. Avoid unnecessary surgery. Address the compression first.
What actually gets a herniated disc to go back in?
Changing the pressure inside the disc. A program like non-surgical spinal decompression oscillates the spine, drops the pressure, and gives the herniated material room to move back off the nerve. The patient in this video was 100% pain-free in 9 weeks.
Decompression works because of pressure, and pressure is everything. It is like an airplane cabin at 10,000 feet. Change the pressure and everything changes. On the table we pull and relax, pull and relax, like an accordion. That oscillation is the entire difference between decompression and traction, and it is the reason hanging upside down is not the same thing.
I know this because I was the patient. April 2020, 35 years old, L5-S1 herniation about 5 mm. Ten years in practice and nothing I knew touched it. I was hopeless, and I mean hopeless, because that is where I was. I bought a decompression table out of desperation and I was pain-free in 5 to 8 weeks.
This is not one lucky case either. In our published peer-reviewed research paper, four patients had disc reductions of 9%, 27%, 30%, and 78% in under 4 months. All four were 100% pain-free. None of them had surgery. Every disc is different and results vary, but the mechanism is the same every time: reduce the disc, free the nerve.
What makes a decompression protocol “proper”?
Three dials, set for your specific disc. Dial one is angle, adjusted in 2.5 degree increments based on the type of herniation and your comfort. Dial two is weight. The textbook says 50% of body weight and that is flawed, way too aggressive. We start low and build. Dial three is oscillation, the pull-and-relax cycle. Get the dials wrong and you have a machine pulling on a spine with no strategy behind it.
Where can you get non-surgical spinal decompression near Walnut Creek?
At our center in Walnut Creek. We run 13 DOC decompression tables and have performed more than 51,000 decompression treatments, and we see patients from Lafayette, Concord, Pleasant Hill, Danville, and across Contra Costa County and the greater Bay Area.
The first step is never the table. The first step is finding out whether your hamstring tightness is actually a disc, and whether you are a candidate. That means reading your MRI properly, correlating it to your exam and your symptoms, and being honest with you about what the disc will and will not do.
My job is to give you hope. For a lot of people who have been stretching for months and getting worse, the hope is simple: stop stretching, find the disc, change the pressure.
Quick questions, straight answers
Is hamstring tightness a symptom of a herniated disc?
It can be. A lumbar disc herniation pressing on the nerves that run down the leg often shows up as hamstring tightness, calf cramping, or a calf that feels like it is on fire. If stretching does not resolve it, or makes it worse, the tightness is coming from the nerve and not the muscle.
Can stretching make sciatica worse?
Yes. Forward-bending stretches push the herniated part of the disc backward into the nerve. That is why many people feel worse the day after stretching. If your sciatica is disc-related, stop the forward folds until the disc has been properly evaluated.
Do inversion tables help a herniated disc?
Not in my experience. An inversion table is just hanging. There is no oscillation and no control over how much pressure comes off the disc, which is why people spasm on them. True spinal decompression uses a controlled pull-and-relax cycle at a specific angle and weight.
How long does it take for a herniated disc to heal with decompression?
It depends on the disc and the patient. The patient in this video was 100% pain-free in 9 weeks. I was pain-free in 5 to 8 weeks on my own L5-S1 herniation. Our published cases showed measurable disc reduction on MRI in under 4 months.
Where can I get a herniated disc evaluated near Walnut Creek?
Contact Dudum Chiropractic in Walnut Creek at (925) 300-3302. We serve patients throughout the East Bay, and patients fly in from around the world for this protocol.
The next step
If you’re dealing with back pain and want to find out whether you’re a candidate for spinal decompression, contact us at Dudum Chiropractic in Walnut Creek or call (925) 300-3302. You deserve relief without spinal surgery.
I’m Dr. JD Dudum. This is Back At It with Dr. Decompression.