Back Pain

Back pain ranks second among all medical consultations, with an annual prevalence close to 50%, and greater than 70% of people experience back pain at some point in their life. The most common localization is the lower back, although upper back pain related to cervical spine disease is also frequent and is usually blamed for unrelated symptoms such as dizziness, headaches, and tinnitus, among others. Although the etiology of upper and lower back pain encompasses a large spectrum of diseases, this entry focuses specifically on the degenerative changes in the lumbar spine, leading to joint and other musculoskeletal alterations that lead to low back pain.

Patients often seek help among different medical specialists, including internists, orthopedic surgeons, rheumatologists, neurosurgeons, physiatrists, and neurologists. If these consultations fail ...