Getting here from Millcreek Common
Millcreek City Hall is part of Millcreek Common, the city center on Chambers Avenue with the Skate Loop, the climbing wall and the Farmers Market. From there, a routing engine built on OpenStreetMap sends you west on 3300 South, south on 1300 East, west on 3900 South, and then south on 900 East to about 4700 South.
About 3.3 miles. Got a route you like better? Take it.
The plaza is Ivy Place, a small strip center just north of the six-way junction where Van Winkle Expressway and Murray-Holladay Road meet 900 East, with Big Cottonwood Creek running close by. Why does the address say Millcreek at all? The Postal Service recognizes Millcreek as a place name for ZIP 84117, but a mailing name isn't a city limit, and the county's parcel record puts the building in the Murray tax district.
Holladay's drive is even simpler, by the way; the Holladay directions are nearly one road.
A young city with an old canyon
Millcreek only became a city on December 28, 2016. Its canyon is much older news: Brigham Young named Millcreek Canyon on August 22, 1847, and today the canyon counts as part of Millcreek City, on the east side of the valley.
That's relevant to backs. With the Pipeline Trail and the Grandeur Peak trail from Church Fork inside city limits, a weekend can mean hours on your feet, then the drive down, then an evening sunk into the couch, and if it's the car and the couch that hurt rather than the trail, notice that.
We count pain that's worse when you sit or drive among the patterns that point toward a disc. Others on that list: pain that travels below the knee, trouble bending forward or standing up from a chair, and flare-ups that settle and then come back.
Commuters get their own version. Millcreek is where I-215 begins, at the mouth of Parley's Canyon, and exits 3 and 4 put you on it at 3300 South and 3900 South. January adds a shovel. Bending over a driveway, then struggling to straighten up afterward, is exactly the kind of detail worth bringing to an exam.
Before anyone mentions the table
Nobody goes straight onto the DRX9000. Dr. Cody Mecham starts with your history, an orthopedic exam and a look at any imaging that's relevant, because decompression is aimed at disc-driven pain, not pain coming from the facet joints, the sacroiliac joint or a strained muscle.
If it fits, a typical plan is 20 to 30 sessions spread over 8 to 12 weeks. Within the first 8 to 12 treatments there should be meaningful change, and when there isn't, the plan gets reconsidered rather than simply continued; the session-by-session version is on what to expect from spinal decompression.
Some people are screened out entirely. A spinal fracture or instability, fusion screws or rods, active cancer involving the spine, pregnancy and an aortic aneurysm all rule it out, and you'll be told plainly if that's you.
And the research? Mixed. A 2013 Cochrane review by Wegner and colleagues found traction did little for pain or function, while Christian Apfel's 2010 study of 30 DRX9000 patients reported pain falling from 6.2 to 1.6 out of 10 with no control group to compare against, and does spinal decompression work sets the two side by side.
Neighbors to the north in South Salt Lake come down 700 East instead. For the bigger picture of spinal decompression in Salt Lake City, start at the home page, or skip ahead: schedule an appointment or phone (801) 590-8615.