Current status in chronic low back pain

Abstract

Low back pain is an important health problem increasing rapidly in industrialised countries. 70 to 85 % of the people suffer from the low back pain in a certain period of their lives. There is no any apparent treatment algorithm for low back pain, such a common social problem. The basic reason of this fact is there are many resources that may lead to pain in lumbar region. Several national and international low back pain treatment guides propose that the patients with low back pain should be treated with multidisciplinary programmes. But, various scientific branches nowadays are a burden for the patients with low back pain, with their different treatment programmes. The surgical interference, as one of the treatment approaches, have been preferred in limited number of patients in the last decade when their results and risks were taken into account. In developing countries where multidisciplinary approaches are less frequently applied and there is no any national programme on the issue, the surgical operation is assumed to be the only solution for low back pain. However, the failed back surgery syndrome, a newly born problem has been the nightmare of the doctors involved in conservative treatments. We hereby present the following case to the readers in order to demonstrate the problems caused by repeated operations and how far the treatment team has been eventually fallen apart from their purposes.