Sacroiliac Joint Disease

Sacroiliac Joint Disease

The sacroiliac joints connect the sacrum (the triangular bone at the bottom of the spine) and the pelvis. The sacroiliac joints are gliding joints and are surrounded by strong ligaments; they do not move much. Their main purpose is to act as shock absorbers and transmit upper body forces to the pelvis and legs. The source of sacroiliac joint pain can either be too much or too little movement and each causes a separate set of symptoms radiating to groin, leg, hips and thighs. Diagnosis can be made by moving the joint to see if it causes pain, injecting a solution into the sacroiliac joint to see if it blocks the pain and ruling out all other causes for the pain by radiological imaging. This can be treated by a sacroiliac joint injection in which local anesthetic (to provide a numbing effect) and steroid (to give longer-lasting pain relief) are injected into the painful joint under fluoroscopic guidance.

See also: Laser Therapy Treatment