Injection of methylene blue may be able to treat cervical and lumbar spine diseases Injection of 1 ml of methylene blue into the degenerated intervertebral disc can treat discogenic back pain. This is the result of years of research by Professor Peng Baogang, director of the Institute of Spine Surgery at the Armed Forces General Hospital, and others. The results were published in the recent issue 4 of the international medical journal Pain, the journal of the International Society for the Study of Pain, in a randomized controlled clinical trial of intradiscal methylene blue injection for the treatment of discogenic low back pain. Chronic low back pain is a serious medical and social problem and is one of the most common causes of workforce loss. It is estimated that 80% of all people have experienced low back pain at some point in their lives. The U.S. Center for Health Statistics reports that 14% of new hospital visits are for low back pain, which equates to 13 million hospital visits for low back pain each year. It is reported that intervertebral disc degeneration is the pathological basis of all these cervical and lumbar spine diseases, including cervical spondylosis, cervical disc herniation, and lumbar disc herniation. Starting from the study of the mechanism of disc degeneration, Peng Baogang et al. started a series of research work on various aspects of disc degeneration causing low back pain, and based on the previously discovered pathogenesis of the disease, they searched for a therapeutic drug, targeting methylene blue, a nerve inactivator. They found that by injecting only 1 ml of methylene blue into the degenerated disc, patients who had been suffering from low back pain for years could regain their spine. The trial was a randomized, double-blind, clinically controlled approach to rule out the psychological comforting effects of the drug on patients. The researchers selected 72 patients with discogenic low back pain of more than 6 months’ duration and randomly divided them into two groups: one group was treated with intradiscal injection of methylene blue and the other group was treated with intradiscal injection of placebo, and through 24-month follow-up, it was found that the average pain reduction in the methylene blue injection group was 52.5%, with a satisfaction rate of 91.6%, while the average pain reduction in the placebo injection group was 0.7%, with a satisfaction rate of 14.3%. There were no side effects or complications in the methylene blue injection group, confirming that methylene blue injection for discogenic low back pain is a safe and effective minimally invasive treatment method.