The epidural space is the sleeve that surrounds the spinal cord and the roots branching off it. When a disc bulges or a joint thickens, a root inside that sleeve gets crowded and inflamed, and the pain shows up somewhere down the limb it serves. The injection puts a small amount of steroid into that sleeve so the swelling around the root comes down.
It is not a painkiller in the usual sense. Nothing is being numbed permanently and nothing is being repaired. What changes is the inflammation, and when the inflammation drops the root stops firing, which is why relief tends to build over several days rather than arriving on the table.
Mountain View Pain Center performs this in office at the Northglenn clinic, 11990 Grant Street, just off I-25 at 120th Avenue, and at the Lowry clinic on specific days. It is an outpatient appointment in a building you can park at, not a hospital admission with paperwork attached.
Patients come to Northglenn from the whole northern half of the metro, and from the south end too, because the appointment is short enough that the drive up I-25 is the longest part of the day. You can be assessed at any of the Denver-area clinics and have the injection at Northglenn or, on specific days, at Lowry; it is one chart and one physician either way.
You are positioned face down, the skin is cleaned, and the area is numbed first so the injection itself is a pressure sensation more than a sharp one. The whole thing takes a few minutes once you are positioned.
Afterwards you sit for a short observation period and then go home. Arrange a driver if you are offered sedation; without it most people drive themselves. The leg or arm may feel heavy or unusually good for a few hours from the local anesthetic, and then return to baseline before the steroid starts to work.
It suits pain that travels — down the back of the leg, into the foot, along the arm — and that has not settled with a fair course of conservative care. It does far less for aching that stays in the middle of the back and never radiates, because that pain usually is not coming from a compressed root.
It is also worth doing when weakness has appeared rather than only pain, because the aim then is to calm the root while strength is rebuilt. The physician will say plainly if the examination points somewhere else, and the answer is sometimes that an injection is not what you need.
Most major commercial plans are accepted in Colorado, and we are in network with most Medicare Advantage plans. Benefits are checked before the appointment so the number is known in advance.
If the pain started in a collision, the injection is billed to the med-pay portion of an auto policy, to a lien where an attorney is involved, or to your health plan. Work injuries go through the carrier on the claim. No referral is required to be assessed, and appointments are usually available within the same week.
The general epidural steroid injection page has more, and Pain Management in Denver covers the wider service.
Every clinic below has Chiropractic, Physical Therapy, Acupuncture and Pain Management on one chart, so care can move between them without a new referral.
Downtown out through the north, west, south and east suburbs.
Academy, InterQuest and Tenderfoot cover the north, central and south of the city.
Harmony in Fort Collins and our Greeley clinic serve Larimer and Weld counties.
Across the Valley, from the West Valley through Phoenix to the East Valley.
It varies widely. Some people get a few weeks, which is enough to make real progress in Physical Therapy; others get months. What you do with the window matters more than the window itself.
More than one is common when the first one helped, and the spacing is decided from your own response rather than a fixed schedule. Repeating something that did nothing is not a plan.
The skin is numbed first, so most people describe pressure rather than pain. The position you lie in is often the part people remember least fondly.
Usually yes if you are not sedated. Ask when the appointment is booked so you can plan the drive up I-25 rather than arranging a lift at the last minute.
Sometimes. Imaging is ordered when the level needs confirming before the injection, and not as a routine box to tick. Bring any scan you already have.
That is information. A root injection that gives nothing points away from the root as the source, and the plan changes accordingly rather than repeating the same step.
No. The injection creates a window in which the rehabilitation finally works, and skipping the rehabilitation is the most common way people end up back where they started.
Yes. You can book directly for Pain Management at any Denver-area clinic, and appointments are usually available within the same week.
Epidural Steroid Injection is performed in office at our Northglenn clinic, and at Lowry on specific days. No referral is needed to be evaluated, and appointments are usually available within the same week.
