The disks are pads that separate the hard vertebral bones of your spine. A disk may be painful when it presses on nerves or the spinal cord, herniates, tears or degenerates. This may cause pain in your neck, middle and lower back, arms, chest wall, abdomen and legs. Muscles, joints and nerves in your spine may cause similar pain. It usually is determined first that these other structures are not your sole pain source before performing disk-space injection.

What is a disk-space injection, and why is it helpful?

Disk-space injection helps confirm that the disk(s) is a source of your pain. This procedure involves placing a needle into the disk and injecting a combination of medicines. The most-effective medicines include numbing and antiinflammatory medicines. Computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) show only anatomy and cannot identify your pain source. The disks often are abnormal on MRI or CT scans but are not the source of pain. Only disk-space injection can tell if the disk is the source of pain. A disk-space injection helps the surgeon plan the correct surgery. Disk-space injection is usually done if you think your pain is significant enough for you to consider surgery.