Almost 40% of patients who were part of a recent study reported virtually no difference in back pain one year after having back surgery. But prior to surgery, almost all of their surgeons predicted that they would have less pain. Most physicians said that surgery would result in “a great deal of improvement.”

The study included interviews with 197 patients who were due for surgery for low back pain. Before the study, the doctors were asked to rate their expected degree of improvement in the patients’ pain. The physicians predicted that 79% would have a great deal of benefit. The physicians also predicted that 99% would see improvement between “moderate” and “great.”

A year after the back surgery, nearly 40% of the patients reported no improvement. Of those that the doctors expected to have “great improvement,” 56% reported no significant improvement in their general health.

A review of this study on MedicineNet.com stated, “The study is not the first to find that surgery is not the cure-all for low back pain that many patients think it is, or the first to suggest that doctors do a poor job of predicting which patients will benefit the most from back surgery.”

Orthopedic surgeon Jeffrey C. Wang of the UCLA Department of Orthopaedic Surgery stated that fewer than 10% of patients with low back pain are appropriate surgical candidates. He acknowledged that there are probably too many back surgeries being performed.

SOURCE: http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=47628&pf=3