Short educational video explaining how intervertebral disc degeneration can lead to pain. It contrasts healthy-disc innervation (limited to the outer annulus fibrosus) with degenerative changes where nerve and neurovascular bundles infiltrate deeper into the annulus and nucleus, enabling pain generation.
Now, a healthy disc is only innervated in the outer layers of the annulus fibrosis, as we've touched on on previous episodes. And when degenerative changes occur, this becomes challenging because we can see nerve tissue start to infiltrate those annulus fibrosis and potentially even get all the way down to the nucleus. Well, guess what? When those fibers go in, when they start growing, they bring with them a neurovascular bundle. Well, guess what the nerve component of that neurovascular bundle can do? It can create the ability have pain.
