Same-week appointments are usually available.
Sciatica is a common type of nerve pain that typically starts in the low back or buttock and can radiate down the leg. It may feel sharp, burning, or electric, and can include numbness or tingling. At Mountain View Pain Center, we help identify what’s irritating the nerve and build a plan to reduce symptoms, restore movement, and support long-term relief. Sciatica-like pain can also come from piriformis syndrome, a tight muscle deep in the buttock that irritates the sciatic nerve.
When to Seek Urgent Care
Seek urgent evaluation if you have new or worsening leg weakness, foot drop, loss of bowel or bladder control, saddle numbness, severe unrelenting pain after trauma, fever/chills, or rapidly worsening numbness/tingling.
We start by identifying your symptom pattern, what triggers it, and where the nerve may be irritated. Your visit may include movement testing, assessment of the low back, hips, and surrounding muscles, and a basic neurologic screen (strength, sensation, reflexes) when symptoms include numbness, tingling, or weakness. We also check for red flags to determine whether imaging or referral is appropriate.
At Mountain View Pain Center, our multidisciplinary team combines evidence-based care to calm nerve irritation and improve function:
Targeted diagnostic injections and image-guided procedures when appropriate to reduce inflammation and calm irritated nerves.
Movement-based care to improve mobility, reduce nerve irritation, and rebuild core/hip stability to prevent recurrence.
Hands-on care to support joint mobility and reduce muscle tension, tailored to your symptoms and comfort. What Chiropractic care for sciatica involves, and when it is not the first step.
A natural option to support pain relief and relaxation, often combined with your broader plan.
Every Mountain View Pain Center clinic has Pain Management, Physical Therapy, Chiropractic care and Acupuncture in the same building, so if sciatica and nerve pain needs more than one kind of care, you do not get handed off to another practice.
Colorado: Denver, Aurora, Colorado Springs, Lakewood, Littleton, Highlands Ranch, Lone Tree, Northglenn, Lafayette, Greeley, Fort Collins.
Arizona: Phoenix, Mesa, Chandler, Glendale, Peoria.
No referral is needed in either state. Find your nearest clinic on the full clinic map, or call Colorado (720) 749-5599 or Arizona (602) 325-2024.
Most sciatica is not an emergency and improves with time and the right treatment. A small number of presentations are different, and they need emergency assessment, not a booked appointment: loss of bowel or bladder control, numbness in the groin or inner thighs (saddle anesthesia), or weakness in both legs. That combination can indicate cauda equina syndrome, and it is a surgical emergency. Progressive, worsening weakness in one leg, a foot that is starting to drag, also warrants prompt evaluation, not watchful waiting.
Sciatica is a symptom, not a diagnosis, and the cause changes the treatment entirely. A herniated or bulging lumbar disc pressing on a nerve root is the most common. Spinal stenosis (narrowing of the nerve passages, and more common after 50) produces a similar leg pain with a different pattern, typically eased by leaning forward. Degenerative disc changes, spondylolisthesis (one vertebra slipped forward on another) and piriformis syndrome, where a deep buttock muscle irritates the nerve directly, round out the list.
Sitting, coughing and sneezing that make the pain worse point one way; pain that eases when you lean on a shopping trolley points another. That is the kind of detail the examination is looking for, and it is why an accurate diagnosis has to come before an injection.
Sciatica is not a diagnosis so much as a description of a route. The sciatic nerve is assembled from roots leaving the lower spine, runs through the buttock, down the back of the thigh, and then divides below the knee to supply the calf, the shin and the foot. Anything that irritates it anywhere along that run produces symptoms along the rest of it.
That is why the distance matters. Pain that stops at the buttock or the back of the thigh is common and frequently comes from the joints or muscles of the low back and hip instead of from the nerve itself. Pain that travels below the knee, and particularly into the foot, is far more likely to be a true nerve root problem, and it is the single most useful question we ask.
It is also why sciatica is almost always one-sided. Symptoms down both legs at once are a different picture and are taken more seriously, not less.
This is the question we get asked more than any other about sciatica, and the reason it is hard to answer in a sentence is that the right starting point depends on one thing: whether the nerve is just irritated, or whether it is losing function.
If the pain travels but the leg still works (full strength, no numb patch you can map, nothing dragging) conservative care is the ordinary first step, and it is what most guidelines describe too. Chiropractic and Physical Therapy address the mechanics, spinal decompression is available at every clinic, and Acupuncture is an option alongside. Most sciatica settles on this route without an injection or surgery.
If the examination finds weakness (a foot that catches, difficulty rising onto the toes on one side, a numb patch with a clear border), the order changes. That is not a reason to panic, but it is a reason for the Pain Management side of the practice to be involved from the start rather than after a course of something else has been tried.
And if there is any loss of bowel or bladder control, numbness in the groin or inner thighs, or weakness in both legs at once, neither answer applies: that needs emergency assessment now.
The practical advantage of starting here instead of choosing in advance is that you do not have to. Chiropractic, Physical Therapy, Acupuncture and Pain Management are under one roof, no referral is needed for any of them, and the examination at the first visit is what decides the order. If the first choice turns out to be the wrong one, changing it is a conversation, not a new referral and a new waiting list.
People describe sciatica in terms they do not use for ordinary back pain: electric, shooting, searing, like a hot wire, like a cramp that will not release. It frequently comes with pins and needles or numbness in a defined patch, and with a sense that the leg is not quite reliable.
The positions that provoke it are informative. Sitting, and particularly sitting in a low soft seat or driving, is often the worst. Standing up after sitting can produce a few seconds of intense pain before it eases. Coughing, sneezing and straining send a jolt down the leg. Many people find walking better than sitting, which surprises them.
Weakness is the symptom to report even when it is mild. A foot that catches on carpet edges, a heel that slaps down, difficulty pushing off on that side, or an inability to rise onto the toes of one foot are all objective findings, and they change how urgently we act.
Most sciatica improves. The irritation settles, the inflammation around the nerve reduces, and the leg symptoms retreat back up the leg, which is the pattern worth knowing about, because symptoms withdrawing from the foot toward the buttock is a good sign even if the buttock is sorer for a while. Symptoms moving the other way, further down the leg, is the signal that something is going in the wrong direction.
We are not going to give you a recovery timeline. The honest position is that published ranges are wide, the variation between people is wider still, and a number invented for reassurance is worth nothing. What we track instead is direction: whether the numb patch is shrinking, whether the strength is returning, how far you can walk and how long you can sit compared with the last visit.
Sciatica that has not budged over a sustained period, or that is accompanied by weakness that is not recovering, is the case where an interventional step or a surgical opinion is discussed. That conversation is driven by the examination, not by how the scan looks.
No referral is needed for any of our service lines, and our goal is to get you in within the same week.
The visit establishes two things. First, whether this is genuinely nerve root pain or a referred pain that looks like it: done through the distribution of the symptoms, the nerve tension tests, reflexes, strength testing of the individual muscle groups, and mapping the area of altered sensation. Second, a baseline: how far you can walk before the leg gives out, how long you can sit, what you have stopped doing. Those are what we measure progress against.
Imaging is used when it would change the plan. Disc bulges show up on the scans of a great many people who have never had a symptom, so a film that does not match the examination tells us very little.
Bring a photo ID and your insurance card, any previous imaging, and a list of medications. If an epidural steroid injection or another interventional step is appropriate, it is performed in office at Northglenn, north Colorado Springs, Mesa and Glendale, and every other clinic coordinates to one of those. Spine injections are also performed at Lowry on specific days.
Not always. A herniated disc is one common cause of sciatica, but stenosis, muscle-related irritation, and other issues can also trigger nerve pain.
Nerve pain often feels burning, electric, or radiating and may include numbness or tingling. We evaluate your symptom pattern and function to clarify the cause.
Most people do better with gentle movement instead of prolonged rest. We’ll guide your progression based on symptoms.
Not always. If symptoms or exam findings suggest imaging would help guide care, we’ll recommend the appropriate next step.
Many patients benefit from coordinated care, often combining PT, Chiropractic care, Acupuncture, and, when appropriate, Pain Management procedures.
Timelines vary based on the cause and severity. Our goal is to reduce pain and restore function while helping prevent repeat flare-ups.
Usually good, in amounts that do not flare it. Prolonged sitting is what most people find worst. The specific advice depends on which position eases your pain, which is part of what the examination establishes.
Sooner if there is weakness instead of only pain. Appointments are usually available within the same week and no referral is needed.
It depends on what the examination finds, not on how much it hurts. If the leg still works normally (full strength, no mappable numb patch), conservative care is the usual first step: Chiropractic, Physical Therapy, spinal decompression, Acupuncture. If there is weakness, a foot that catches, or numbness with a clear border, Pain Management should be involved from the start. Loss of bowel or bladder control, groin numbness, or weakness in both legs needs emergency assessment instead of either one. All four services are under one roof here and no referral is needed, so the first visit decides the order, not you having to.
The same care, written for the metro you are in: sciatica treatment in Denver, sciatica treatment in Colorado Springs, or sciatica treatment in Phoenix.
Each page names the clinics in that metro, what the first visit involves, and where an interventional step would be performed if one is needed.
Pain that stops at the buttock or the groin, instead of traveling below the knee, more often belongs with hip pain.
Sciatica (Nerve Pain) is treated at every Mountain View Pain Center clinic in Colorado and Arizona. See the full clinic map, Colorado or Arizona.
