Non-Specific Low
Back Pain
Low Back Pain is well known to at least 80% of
people.
The cause can be ascertained in many cases with the
help of modern diagnostic techniques such as MRI.
In other cases, these modern diagnostic techniques
only serve to exclude all known and understood causes leaving
"Non-Specific Low Back Pain"
(or "Discogenic Back
Pain" as there is some evidence that such pain originates in the disc.)
In this Website, I suggest that the origin for Non-Specific Low Back
Pain lies in an unexpected,
and as yet unrecognised, limitation in the flexion of the lowest two
disks, L4/5 and L5/S
These two discs, and only
these two, have evolved
in the human spine to
have their normal range of
flexion and extension
only on the extension side
of what might be
called the central position (parallel
sided). In other
words, the wedge shape of the disc,
as seen in lateral
x-ray, should always be maintained.
The thickness of the
disc anteriorly should always
be greater than the
posterior thickness. (This, of course,
applies to the natural
and pain free spine.)
This Suggestion
raises a Multitude of Questions
1) Is this
suggestion supported by any published work?
2) Is there a
therapy corresponding to this?
3) Why has
this strange shape evolved in the human spinal column? Columns are straight!
4) What is
the pain causing mechanism?
5) Why is the
pain so severe and so persistent?
6) Why is so
much pain in the pelvis and leg? (S/I and Sciatic pain.)
7) What
causes flexion to be excessive in an individual?
8) Will
flexion beyond this parallel sided limit always cause pain?
9) Is this
flexion limitation to be found in all of us?
10) If the answer
to question 7 is the cause, what is the solution?
11) How is
this connected with disc degeneration?
12) I don’t
understand the argument!
13) What Seating products
are available?
This front page describes and explains the basic cause of
low back pain. For thirty-six years I have studied
back pain and other musculo-skeltal
problems that I have met as a chiropractor or as a human being with those very
same problems
myself ! This includes writings of all types during these years and development
of multiple forms of car seat and office
chair. Some of
these are products sold by Pelvic Posture Ltd or Gorman Design Ltd but many
were prototypes.
The next page attempts to put this into some logical
grouping.