My father has the same problem with his back he has been a mechanic all his life
He was also told he is out of luck without extensive surgery which might not fix anything
One thing they did to help was give him a pulley thing that hooks to the top of the door in his room. It hooks around his neck then to the top of the door then to a weight bag. You put a certain amount of water in the bag for what vertibrate is messed up and it pulls on it to releave the pressure
That and lots of Vicadin.