For most patients, conservative treatment is still the first choice for the treatment of lumbar instability. There are many non-surgical treatment methods, which can be generally summarized as follows: (1) rest and exercise, avoid overloading the lumbar spine, bed rest during the acute period, and functional exercise of the lumbar back muscles during the remission period; bed rest to reduce the load of the intervertebral joints and lumbar back muscles. The lumbar back and abdominal muscle exercise can strengthen its own dynamic structure to achieve the purpose of stabilizing the spine and slowing down the symptoms. (2) Wearing braces can maintain the stability of the lumbar spine and reduce symptoms, but prolonged use can easily lead to lumbar muscle atrophy. Therefore, it is recommended that patients actively perform functional exercises of the lumbar back while wearing the brace to avoid the adverse consequences of long-term use of the brace. (3) Physical therapy, such as massage, acupuncture, small acupuncture, heat, electrical stimulation, laser and ultrasound, can relieve muscle tension, reduce spinal pressure, promote inflammation absorption and relieve symptoms. (4) Pharmacological treatment can be used anti-inflammatory and pain-relieving non-steroidal anti-inflammatory and pain-relieving drugs, Chinese medicine on the basis of tonifying the liver and kidney supplemented with blood activation and blood stasis, circulation and pain relief, strengthening of tendons and bones, as well as with the dispelling of rheumatism, qi and blood herbal treatment. (5) Local closure therapy can eliminate inflammation and relieve symptoms, which is especially suitable for patients with acute pain, unsuitable for surgery or who need to postpone surgery, but prolonged use can also cause complications such as infection and scar formation at the needle entry site. The treatment of surgery must be based on the clinical symptoms and signs of the patient, and it is generally believed that patients with the following indications can undergo surgery: (1) patients with low back pain and/or spinal cord nerve root or cauda equina compression or pulling symptoms who have been ineffective after 6 months of regular conservative treatment require aggressive treatment; (2) lumbar hyperextension and hyperflexion radiographs of lumbar 3-5 segments with ≥3mm horizontal displacement between adjacent vertebrae, lumbar 5, sacral 1 (3) CT or MRI examination of the lumbar spine suggests disc degeneration, thickening of the ligamentum flavum, bilateral small joint hyperplasia and bone superfluity formation at the anterior edge of the vertebral body, and there may be intervertebral space narrowing. At present, the commonly used surgical procedures mainly include laminar decompression, bone graft fusion, internal fixation of the vertebral arch and non-fusion. The selection of surgical plan is based on the patient’s symptoms, signs and imaging examinations, and the purpose of surgery is first to relieve the patient’s clinical symptoms. Fusion fixation is to ensure the stability of the spine to eliminate symptoms and is the classical surgical method currently used; non-fusion surgery is to ensure the stability of the spine on the basis of preserving the movement of the spinal segments and is an ideal surgical approach, but there are still many aspects of clinical practice that need further study and improvement.