Question
I have severe pain in my L5 which I feel more on the right side of my body. My bone clicks in and out while I am standing still or if I lay down. I have had years of chiropractic treatment but it has got worse in the last 6 months. It began when I had my first child 30 years ago and became worse after I broke my coccyx 3 years ago. I recently started seeing a back rehab doctor who has been putting on the DRX 9000 3 times a week for 4 weeks (not cheap) My concerns are he does not always strap me in this is often left to the receptionists who are not qualified in my opinion. Last week I was not strapped in tight enough and when the machine started the harness slipped down a good 6 inches and I felt like it was wasted. This week I went and was strapped in so tight i felt stretched to the max before he even turned on the machine. Afterwards I could not walk, I nearly passed out with the pain. I managed to drive home but could not get out of the car. Now I am in so much pain 2 days later I am taking painkillers I never had before. I am worried about going again. I am spending thousands on dollars to be in agony what are your thoughts?

Answer
Your question was more of a procedural one, not really a clinical one. If you feel that the procedure was not performed correctly, you have to tell the doctor. How could you expect to have a good result if the harness was not attached properly?  Now, if you want my opinion on DRX/decompression therapy, it works wonders. So perhaps you need less pull on the machine at this time so you do not get worse. You should not be in agony. In my office we do spinal decompression based on a percentage of the patient's body weight. We do specific settings based on if we want to treat the spinal joints vs the disc and if the patient has muscle spasm or not. I would also suggest a two week trial first of 6 visits to see how you respond before you go further. Also, you can have spinal decompression performed for around two thousand dollars total. You do not have to use only the DRX machine. Hope this helps advise you, get a second opinion if you are concerned.