Journal ArticleDOI
Abnormal magnetic-resonance scans of the lumbar spine in asymptomatic subjects. A prospective investigation
TLDR
In this paper, the authors performed magnetic resonance imaging on sixty-seven individuals who had never had low-back pain, sciatica, or neurogenic claudication, and found that about one-third of the subjects were found to have a substantial abnormality.Abstract:
We performed magnetic resonance imaging on sixty-seven individuals who had never had low-back pain, sciatica, or neurogenic claudication. The scans were interpreted independently by three neuro-radiologists who had no knowledge about the presence or absence of clinical symptoms in the subjects. About one-third of the subjects were found to have a substantial abnormality. Of those who were less than sixty years old, 20 per cent had a herniated nucleus pulposus and one had spinal stenosis. In the group that was sixty years old or older, the findings were abnormal on about 57 per cent of the scans: 36 per cent of the subjects had a herniated nucleus pulposus and 21 per cent had spinal stenosis. There was degeneration or bulging of a disc at at least one lumbar level in 35 per cent of the subjects between twenty and thirty-nine years old and in all but one of the sixty to eighty-year-old subjects. In view of these findings in asymptomatic subjects, we concluded that abnormalities on magnetic resonance images must be strictly correlated with age and any clinical signs and symptoms before operative treatment is contemplated.read more
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
Tissue characterization of symptomatic and asymptomatic disc herniations by quantitative magnetic resonance imaging.
Norbert Boos,Daniel Dreier,Esther Hilfiker,Volker Schade,Roland Kreis,Josef Hora,Max Aebi,Chris Boesch +7 more
TL;DR: It is suggested that symptomatic and morphologically matched asymptomatic disc herniations differ with regard to disc matrix composition.
Journal ArticleDOI
One- and two-level anterior cervical discectomy and fusion: the effect of plate fixation
TL;DR: The Cervical Spine Locking Plate improved the outcome of two-level procedures to that of uninstrumented one-level fusions and was paralleled by a better clinical outcome.
Journal ArticleDOI
Current concepts in intervertebral disk restoration
Ashish D. Diwan,Hari K. Parvataneni,Safdar N. Khan,Harvinder S. Sandhu,Harvinder S. Sandhu,Federico P. Girardi,Federico P. Girardi,Frank P. Cammisa,Frank P. Cammisa +8 more
TL;DR: The structure and function of the intervertebral disk, the pathogenesis of its degeneration, and the clinical relevance of degenerative disk disease are summarized.
Journal ArticleDOI
Long-term exercise adherence in the elderly with chronic low back pain.
TL;DR: The exercise behaviors of many elderly adults with chronic low back pain can increase after an exercise-oriented spine physical therapy program, and improvements in flexibility and strength occurred during treatment.
Journal Article
Skeletal Scintigraphy of Young Patients with Low-Back Pain and a Lumbosacral Transitional Vertebra
Leonard P. Connolly,Pierre A. d’Hemecourt,Susan A. Connolly,Laura A. Drubach,Lyle J. Micheli,S. Ted Treves +5 more
TL;DR: Skeletal scintigraphy often indicates stress at the transverse-sacral articulation of young patients with low-back pain and a lumbosacral transitional vertebra and its use supports its use in these patients.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Back pain and sciatica.
TL;DR: Low back pain is usually a self-limiting symptom, but it costs at least $16 billion each year and disables 5.4 million Americans, and the fact that a benign physical condition has such an importa...
Journal ArticleDOI
A study of computer-assisted tomography. I. The incidence of positive CAT scans in an asymptomatic group of patients.
TL;DR: To study the type and number of CAT scan abnormalities of the lumbar spine that occur in asymptomatic people, 52 studies from a control population with no history of back trouble were mixed randomly with six scans from patients with surgically proven spinal disease, and all were interpreted by three neuroradiologists in a blinded fashion.
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Abnormal myelograms in asymptomatic patients.
TL;DR: The incidence of myelographic abnormalities in 300 patients who were studied by posterior fossa myelography to establish a diagnosis of acoustic tumor is reported, even though patients had no symptoms of cervical or lumbar nerve root compression at the time of the examination.
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The question of lumbar discography.
TL;DR: It has not been established whether internal derangement of the lumbar disc is sufficiently symptom-producing to be a therapeutic objective, especially a surgical one, or whether it represetits anything more than an aging process, and the patterns of degeneration seen in 628 of 2,187 discs injected by the Cleveland group and 773 of 6,784 discs injections by Feinberg or 322 of 870 disc injected by Massie and Stevens may represent nothing more than normal patterns for the age
Journal ArticleDOI
Lumbar herniated disk disease and canal stenosis: prospective evaluation by surface coil MR, CT, and myelography
TL;DR: The results of this study indicate that a technically adequate MR examination was equivalent to CT and myelography in the diagnosis of lumbar canal stenosis and herniated disk disease.