Synonyms in the wider sense

Low back pain, Lumbago, pain in the small of the back, lumbar syndrome, lumbar root syndrome, compression syndrome, lumbar inter-vertebral syndrome, sciatic syndrome, sciatica, facet syndrome, vertebral joint pain, myofascial syndrome, tendomyosis, spondylogenic reflex syndrome, cervical-brachial syndrome

Definition

The term “back pain” stands for pain in the area of the sacrum. In English literature it is summed up as “low back pain”. Looking at the various terms above, we can see that back pain can have different causes. The cause of the pain does not necessarily have to be located in the back. Often different causes can be found (urological, gynecological ….) that must be sorted out through differential diagnostics.

It is the duty of the examining doctor to discover the cause of the clinical picture of back pains and treat the illness at its source.

Back pain that originates in the area of the vertebral column and the neck is described as a symptom-complex with regionally limited pain and differently extended disruptions of the function of the vertebral column. The following illnesses affect, e.g. the vertebral column and the neck: autonomic pain, cervicalgia, cervical syndrome, brachialgia, dorsalgia, lumbago, lumbalgia, sciatalgia, radicular pain, pseudo-radicular pain. In certain circumstances back pain can be dispersed. This is, for example, the case with the clinical picture of lumbar-glutealgia (spreading of the pain into the buttocks) or lumbar sciatica (spreading of the pain into the leg).

This sort of pain usually is chronic, i.e.: it is reoccurring. Normally there are no neurological symptoms in these cases.

Due to the fact that the reoccurrence is typical for this sort of pain, it is also called a chronic pain disease, normally without neurological symptoms.

x-ray picture of lumbar vertebral column: intervertebral disc (blue) vertebral body sacrum (red)