Bone spurs, osteophytes for technical, can cause ferocious pain or zero pain. Unfortunately, a bone spur injury, like a heel spur, can sideline a fitness enthusiast.
An osteophyte is a bony projection, developing along the edge of any bone. Most often where bones meet, like at your joints, for instance knee, foot, shoulder, neck and back.
Bone spurs rub against adjacent nerves, tendons, ligaments or bones, causing:
- pain
- inflammation
- joint movement limitation
Your experiencing any of these symptoms depends on where your spurs are located, for instance:
- fingers ~ painful & disfiguring
- back ~ nerve pain & numbness
- heel or foot ~ weight bearing difficulty
- knee ~ painful leg extension and flexion; interfere with knee joint mechanics
- shoulder ~ restrict the range of motion of your arm; rotator cuff tendinitis & tears
- neck ~ protrude inward causing swallowing and breathing difficulties; squeeze off a vein causing restricted blood flow to your brain
Osteophytes can cause or make a spurring contribution to other conditions, like:
- plantar fasciitis
- diffuse idiopathic skeletal hyperostosis ~ causes bony growths to form on spinal ligaments
- spinal stenosis ~ contributes to a narrowing your spine , putting pressure on your spinal cord
- spondylosis ~ osteoarthritis & bone spurs cause degeneration of the bones in your neck or lower back
Bone spurs can also form on their own. They’re routinely found in older individuals not suffering from osteoarthritis or any other spur promoting disease.
Foot, neck, back and other spurs may be created to add stability to aging joints. They actually provide a benefit by causing a redistribution of weight to protect aging cartilage areas.
One fitness preserving example is that a bone spur can be a causal result of osteoarthritis, as your body attempts to repair broken down joint cartilage.
Additionally, bone spurs can break off, float around in the area and potentially cause intermittent joint locking.
There’s no specific treatment for bone spurs, much depends on their location and fitness affects. If your osteophyte causes no pain nor range of motion issues, then treatment is not typically necessary. If your bone spurs causes pain, NSAIDs is a common treatment recommendation for pain relief.
Going to the extreme, if your bone spur limits motion or causes other daily activity or fitness problems, you may require surgery. The two types of surgery to remove bone spurs are:
- open procedure ~ cuts open the skin to access
- arthroscopically ~ several small incisions to insert surgical tools and uses a tiny camera to see inside
Bone spur removal is often done in conjunction with other joint correction procedures.
Obviously, arthroscopic surgery leaves you with less of a spurred scar.