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Primary care providers are often the first stop for patients experiencing chronic back pain. When a provider suspects that such pain is caused by axial spondyloarthritis (SpA), the next step should be a prompt referral to a rheumatologist, with a note that the patient should be considered a high...
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Here’s some big news for every health care provider who treats one of the 619 million patients with low back pain (LBP) each year; The World Health Organization (WHO) just released its first-ever guidelines for managing chronic LBP. The guidelines, which the WHO called “key, achievable interventions...
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Health care professionals treating stroke survivors could find themselves with additional patients—the family members who care for stroke patients, who, in turn, start to suffer from lower back pain (LBP) themselves.
It’s long been known, and documented in the literature, that caregivers of...
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A BMC Women’s Health article evaluates back pain and reason(s) more women suffer from it than men. They specifically looked at pregnancy and childbirth, and the likelihood of future back pain. 12,776 women were contacted; 1069 made it to the final stage of the study. Notable findings:
- 33%...
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A retrospective review of high or mid thoracic vertebral compression fractures (VCF) examined outcomes after either high viscosity cement (HVC) vertebroplasty (VP) or low viscosity cement (LVC) balloon kyphoplasty (BKP) repairs. 114 patients in a single tertiary medical center were included. Outcome...
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What are the major causes of sciatica? What treatments—such as NSAIDs, acetaminophen, systemic corticosteroids, epidurals, exercise therapy, surgery—work best for sciatica? What about prevention? Researchers, publishing their findings in Cureus, reviewed articles to uncover the most effective aids...
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Does cannabis lessen chronic low back pain? Does the level of THC or CBD make a difference? What about the method of ingestion? Just over 20 patients were included in a study, their disc herniation or spinal stenosis confirmed via CT or MRI. After various washout periods, participants were...
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A study in the PAIN journal examined whether comorbidities aided in determining if back pain led to further disability. Over 450 patients ≥55 years of age were included in the prospective cohort study that looked at the 1 year clinical course of back pain related disability. Questionnaires were used...
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Low back pain is a major problem for far too many people. Scientists from Australian and European universities have published their pain research in JAMA. Patients with chronic back pain (lasting longer than 3 months) were randomized into intervention or sham procedure and attention control groups...
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At the recent International Neuromodulation Society (INS) congress in Barcelona, researchers promoted a new way to administer stimulation to the spinal cord. The usual method involves SCS “to stimulate the back of the spinal cord and activate a circuit that then interacts with the transmitting pain...