Are you taking more sick leaves than earlier just because of your low back pain? Or is it that every time you give your child your hands to lift them on your shoulders, your low back pain clutches your hand in its grip? Don’t worry, you are not alone. Almost everyone has back pain at some stage of their life that interrupts with their comfortable and easy-going life. It is one of the most common neurological ailments that affect men and women equally. Fortunately, most of the cases of low back pain go away within a few days excepting the fact that some take longer or lead to serious conditions. We can classify low back pain according to the duration of symptoms: acute (less than 4 weeks), sub acute (4–12 weeks), and chronic (greater than 12 weeks).

Do you feel low back pain while lifting something heavy or when you overstretch? If the answer to this is ‘Yes’, don’t take it lightly. Many back pain causes can be related to that. As you age, your bone strength and elasticity and tone of muscles gradually decrease. If you have had any traumatic event in your life, like car accident or fall from height, then that can also be one of the causes of low back pain. Most causes of low back pain are due to skeletal degeneration or musculoligamentous injury.

Don’t be so pessimistic, low back pain treatment is not so complex. It starts with just a few steps, but before starting any treatment, you must be sure that you know your diagnosis and consult with your doctor. Giving rest to your spine is the first step for the treatment of low back pain. Anti-inflammatory medications or NSAIDs prove beneficial for the treatment of both back pain and associated inflammation. Heat pack applications help ease much of the discomfort caused by the muscle spasm leading to back pain. Strengthening the back muscles is one of the most important steps in the treatment of occurrences of low back pain. When conservative treatment does not prove much effective in reducing pain or when the patient shows neurologic symptoms like leg weakness, surgery may be indicated.