News and Features Related to Back Pain

1. Soft Bed or Hard Bed for Back Pain?
   

   April 3, 2008 -- If Goldilocks had lower back pain, she'd still prefer the bed that was just right. It's one of the most common questions back pain patients ask. Which is better -- Daddy Bear's hard mattress or Mommy Bear's soft one? Kim Bergholdt, DC, of Denmark's Funen Back Center, and colleagues

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2. What’s Really Making Your Back Hurt
   

   By Maura Kelly This morning, you probably didn’t think twice about slinging a work tote over your shoulder or picking your sneakers up off the floor. But there may come a time when one of those simple motions will trigger a backache bad enough to cause you to call in sick, see a doctor, or at the ve

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3. Surgery an Option for Spinal Stenosis
   

   Feb. 20, 2008 -- Surgery is more effective than other treatments for one of the most common causes of serious back pain in older adults, new research shows. About 400,000 Americans over the age of 60 suffer from spinal stenosis, a condition where the spinal canal narrows, pinching the nerves within

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4. $86 Billion Spent on Back, Neck Pain
   

   Feb. 12, 2008 -- More U.S. health care dollars are spent treating back and neck pain than almost any other medical condition, but much of that money may be wasted, a new study suggests. Researchers from the University of Washington, Seattle, found that the nation's dramatic rise in expenditures for

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5. Acute Back Pain: Spine Therapy No Help
   

   Nov. 8, 2007 -- If you've come down with low back pain but stay active and take a mild painkiller, you won't get any extra relief from spinal manipulative therapy, a new study suggests. That's not what physiotherapist Mark J. Hancock, MAappSc, and colleagues at the University of Sydney, Australia, h

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6. Back Pain: Medication and Addiction
   

   In the last few years, everyone's heard about the apparent epidemic of prescription drug addiction, especially to narcotic painkillers. We see human-interest stories on the news about regular folks getting hooked on OxyContin or Vicodin. Every few months, it seems, we get another news release from a

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7. Low Back Pain: Many Options for Relief
   

   Oct. 1, 2007 -- People who suffer low back pain have high odds of finding relief without surgery, an expert panel says. The panel, made up of experts from the American Pain Society and the American College of Physicians, has released guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of low back pain. The g

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8. Study: Acupuncture Eases Low Back Pain
   

   Sept. 24, 2007 -- Acupuncture proved to be more effective than conventional lower back pain treatments in a new study, but it was no more effective than a sham needle procedure. The German study compared outcomes among 1,162 patients with chronic low back pain treated with traditional Chinese acupun

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9. Get Your Back in Business
   

   By Leah Hennen 16 ways to fix your house so you never hurt again. Here's a stat to make chills go down your spine: You have a 50-50 chance of being sidelined by back pain within a year. Lack of exercise and excess weight contribute to the problem, but experts say the wrong household setup worsens yo

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10. Back Pain Often Ends Without Surgery
    

    May 30, 2007 -- For two specific kinds of back and leg pain, back surgery offers the fastest relief -- but those who choose nonsurgical treatments get better, too. Two separate studies reported in this week's New England Journal of Medicine show that surgery is the fastest route to pain relief for t

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