Low back pain

Low back pain refers to pain in the lower back. Common, and most of the time not serious, low back pain can have several origins. Doctissimo takes stock of the causes of low back pain, risk factors, treatment and prevention advice to avoid back pain.

What is low back pain? 

Low back pain, commonly known as back pain , lumbago or “ rein turn ”, is pain located in the lumbar vertebrae . These pains can go down to the buttocks, or even to the back of the knees .

Most often, low back pain is linked to the world of work: it accounts for 20% of accidents at work and 7% of occupational diseases 1 . It is estimated that 2 out of 31 employees have suffered or will suffer from back pain. 

There are  two types of low back pain:

• Common low back pain:  this can cause mild to very severe pain , and is extremely common (about 60% of the adult population 2 report having had back pain). The prevalence is highest between 55 and 65 years old ;
• Symptomatic or specific  low back pain  : it is rare (less than 1%), but it is necessary to think about it systematically because the diagnostic error is heavy with consequences . 

Low back pain symptoms

In case of low back pain, you may also feel a  feeling of blockage or  difficulty in making certain movements . Pain is of two types :  

• Inflammatory: they cause pain of the inflammatory type :  spontaneous, not linked to the movements of the joint , nocturnal , which manifests itself during the second half of the night, in the early morning and which wakes the patient up . It is prolonged by a strong morning stiffness of the rachis decreasing more or less during the day;
• Mechanical:  the most common , cause pain of the mechanical type , which appears  when using a joint , most often during the day and is not intense enough to wake the patient during his position changes during sleep . It is often maximum at the end of the day and can interfere with falling asleep . Among them, sudden-onset low back pain , which is sometimes called "rein turn" , due to a disco-radicular impingement, vertebral compression or trauma . 

In the case of common low back pain, lumbago or acute low back pain is the most common picture. It is characterized by  low lumbar pain , occurring suddenly on the occasion of an effort, with feeling of blocking , and is accompanied by a major functional impotence , the sometimes intense pain being able to be relieved only in decubitus. Coughing and defecation efforts are often the cause of painful paroxysms.