Sacroiliac Joint

A common and often overlooked source of leg pain can be the sacroiliac joint. The sacroiliac joint is a joint in your pelvis that is responsible for Bearing all the weight from the upper body onto your lower body and hips. Misalignment of this joint can cause low back pain as well as leg pain.

In this latest study researchers compared physical therapy, chiropractic, and corticosteroid injections to see which treatment was most effective for alleviating the leg pain due to sacroiliac joint problems.

The study’s findings revealed that manual therapy is the superior choice for treating leg pain associated with the Sacroiliac joint. The success rate for chiropractic manual therapy was 72%, compared to just 20% for physiotherapy and 50% for corticosteroid injections. Researchers also found that neither physical therapy nor injections resulted in significant pain relief, whereas manual therapy resulted in a significant improvement on pain scores.

Source: Visser L, Woudenberg N, et al. Treatment of the sacroiliac joint in patients with leg pain: a randomized-controlled trial. European Spine Journal 2013 [online]. doi: 10.1007/s00586-013-2833-2.

By Kevin Fielden