Traction pulls in a straight line, head to toe. Blunt - it pulls on everything at once.
Decompression came later and pulls at a specific angle, so the force can be aimed.
In 1994, neurosurgeons measured pressure inside a patient's disc on a decompression table. Disc pressure is always positive - you're always being squeezed, even lying flat.
Not less pressure. The opposite of pressure: the disc goes from squashed to gently drawn open.
Small study, and it doesn't tell us how those patients felt afterwards - only that the machine physically does what it claims.
Small study, and it doesn't tell us how those patients felt afterwards - only that the machine physically does what it claims.
A 2022 trial randomly gave people real decompression or a dummy version, and scanned before and after.
Being straight with you: back pain improved in both groups by a similar amount, so the discs clearly changed but the effect on pain was less clear-cut. Most decompression studies are small, and NICE still advises against traction despite using the older 70's style traction.
