Is it sport's hernia?
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Is it sport's hernia?
A patient brought his son, highly touted baseball prospect, into the office. His baseball career was abruptly halted when chronic groin pain occurred. He was told it was a hernia, so he followed the doctor's advice and had surgery for it. That didn't help. They next told him it was caused by an iliopsoas muscle strain. So he worked with various therapies to relieve the muscle strain. Those did not help either. His back was finally x-rayed, where they found some degenerative disc changes. At this time, the team doctor began talking surgery.
This case brings up a good point for any athlete whose diagnosis continues to change. Nobody knows what is wrong with you! Go to a Prolotherapist or Orthopedic Medicine specialist.
Orthopedic Medicine is a discipline in which the physicians are specialists in all of the non-surgical techniques for treating chronic pain. This includes, but is not limited to, manipulation, massage, and physiotherapy techniques, as well as the various injection techniques for pain, including Prolotherapy.
The patient's son had significant tenderness over the pubic symphysis, which was expected. His iliopsoas muscle was also very tender and he had some degenerative changes in the lower lumbar spine on MRI. The joints beneath the iliopsoas muscle are the hip joint and the lumbosacral junction where the degeneration was located. Palpation of the hip joint did not produce pain, but a positive jump sign was elicited at the iliolumbar ligaments, lumbosacral ligaments, and sacroiliac ligaments.
Many athletes are subjected to hernia surgeries for groin pain, which has nothing to do with a hernia. We have bailed out many a surgeon who referred patients to us (or the patients came on their own) after the hernia surgery failed to "cure" them of their groin pain.
Groin pain coming from an iliolumbar ligament injury or dysfunctions at the thoracolumbar junction, may at times be mistaken for hernia injury. Athletes are again cautioned to rule out all of the possible causes of groin pain, and consult a doctor who performs Prolotherapy when such symptoms are present.
Article by Ross Hauser, M.D.
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