People suffering from back pain Patients are often mistreated

Back pain is a health and economic problem

More than 540 million people worldwide suffer from back pain, but many receive the wrong treatment, as one English research team found in a study. The key messages of the study are:

• Current treatment approaches for back pain are inefficient.
• Back pain causes massive failures.
• Doctors too often prescribe the wrong treatments.
• Medicines with opiates are only partially effective in back pain.
• Targeted sports activities are rarely used for back pain.
• The researchers call for a conceptual transformation of the treatments.

An English research team from Keele University, in collaboration with health organizations around the world, clarifies grievances in the treatment of back pain. These range from the excessive use of inappropriate tests, the regulation of wrong treatment and medication to unnecessary surgery. The study results appear in a three-part series in the journal "The Lancet".

Back pain is a massive global problem. To make matters worse, current treatment methods are inefficient, according to a recent study. (Image: staras / fotolia.com)

Back pain - The most common cause of disability worldwide

Back pain is the most common physical restriction in the world and affects an estimated 540 million people. The current research shows to what extent the disease is mistreated. The treatment methods used are often in conflict with the guidelines for back pain.

Wrong advice

The scientists were able to show that in practice the wrong treatments are often prescribed and doctors often give wrong advice. The guidelines provide information and advice on physical activity. Instead, many patients are quieted and ill-written. Often, severe painkillers including opiates are used. In addition, too many scans or surgeries are performed on people with back pain.

The gap between ideal treatment and common practice

Professor Nadine Foster, one of the main authors of the study, explains the gap that exists between theoretical ideal treatment and real practical application. "We need to keep funding away from ineffective or harmful tests and treatments," Foster said in a press release on the study's findings. Instead, approaches to physical activity and function need to be promoted.

New approaches

Foster calls for further research into new, promising approaches that aim to help people with lower back pain better, more productive lives, and longer working lives.

Back pain from an economic point of view

The Global Burden of Disease study from 2017 highlighted that back pain is the main cause of disability in almost all high-income countries such as Central Europe, Eastern Europe, North Africa, the Middle East and parts of Latin America's back pain. Taken together, every year in the UK a proud one million years through sick leave and inability to work because of back pain together. In the US it is even 3 million years.

Example USA

Back pain causes 2.6 million emergency visits every year in the United States, where a large number of opiates are prescribed. The researchers point to a 2009 study that found that opioids were prescribed in the United States in about 60 percent of emergency consultations for back pain. Only about half of people with chronic back pain were treated with sports activities.

Painkillers have only a limited effect

"In many countries, painkillers that have a limited positive effect are routinely prescribed for lower back pain," says Foster. However, the emphasis in this treatment must be on specific exercises.

Low back pain

"In the UK, we know that low back pain is very common," says Foster. All eleven percent of all disabilities are attributed to back pain. Over the past two decades, there has been a 12% increase in disability associated with back pain. So the problem is getting worse and worse as the population ages.

Current treatment approaches are inefficient

"Our current treatment approaches are unable to reduce the burden of back pain," commented Professor Martin Underwood of Warwick University. The way we approach the treatment of back pain needs to be changed.

Who suffers from back pain?

Adults of working age are often affected by back pain. Only in rare cases can a specific cause be identified. Most cases are called unspecific. According to the researchers, there are indications that psychological and economic factors play an important role in the persistence of low back pain.

Better education

The authors suggest that health care systems should avoid harmful and useless treatments for back pain. Also, widespread misunderstandings about the causes, prognosis and effectiveness of various treatments for back pain in the population and among professionals in the health care industry need to be clarified.

Researchers call for government support

"Protecting the public from unproven or harmful approaches to relieving back pain requires governments and healthcare executives to tackle deadlocked and counterproductive strategies, interest groups, and financial and professional incentives that maintain the status quo," study author Professor Jan Hartvigsen of the University said University of Southern Denmark. (Vb)