What is low back pain and what does it mean? In layman’s terms, low back pain is pain that occurs in the area of the human back from the lower edge of the rib cage on both sides to just above the hips. Have you ever had low back pain? If your answer is no, don’t be too optimistic yet, maybe it will appear in the near future. It is important to know that 85% of people in developed countries will experience low back pain at least once in their lifetime. In the United States, coming to the doctor for low back pain has become the third most common reason for visits after cough and respiratory infection visits, and in China, the number is very close. Low back pain is mostly seen in people over the age of 30, and we usually hear friends, colleagues and family members around us complain about low back pain, and some are even unable to do their normal work because of low back pain, and in severe cases, they cannot even take care of themselves in their daily lives. Although low back pain is a common disease, it is often easy to be ignored. Many people have unexplained low back pain, think that it is not a big problem, there is no harm to the body, lie down and rest or take some medicine at home to slowly pass, but do not know that a small back pain is also an invisible killer, let us first look at a real example. Old Wang is 61 years old, about 1 year ago there is no obvious reason for the sudden emergence of low back pain, more activity will be aggravated, at first he and his family did not pay attention, the pain is heavy on their own oral painkillers, bed rest for a few days. But after more than a month, the condition has not improved, and slowly the pain will affect the night sleep. Wang went to the local hospital to take a lumbar x-ray, the doctor diagnosed him with lumbar strain, prescribed some oral medication, symptomatic treatment, massage more than 20 times, the pain was relieved. But two months ago the lumbar pain suddenly worsened and could not be relieved by medication, so Wang and his family came to the orthopedic clinic of Beijing Military General Hospital. Further prostate ultrasound confirmed prostate cancer, and lumbar puncture biopsy pathology showed bone metastases from prostate cancer, which had reached an advanced stage of cancer. It is easy to see through this real case that lumbar pain can be a precursor to many diseases and can endanger our lives if we are not careful. Most people think that low back pain is not a big deal, but in the eyes of orthopedic surgeons, a little low back pain is not that simple. There may be dozens of causes of low back pain, and common causes related to orthopedics include lumbar muscle strain, fasciitis, lumbar small joint disorders, lumbar intervertebral disc lesions (such as herniated discs, etc.), etc. For the elderly, especially postmenopausal elderly women, there may also be severe osteoporosis or even vertebral fractures causing low back pain. How to make a simple judgment of your back pain symptoms to avoid delaying the condition with serious consequences? We all know that we need to pay attention to the red, yellow and green signals in our daily driving. When the yellow light is on, we need to pass carefully and pay attention to avoid possible dangers, while when the red light is on, we need to pay extra attention. For low back pain, there are also such red and yellow light warnings, and the different levels of warnings indicate that the patient’s low back pain is closely related to a serious disease with a high risk, and should be taken seriously enough to seek early medical attention. Patients with low back pain should be alerted if they are younger than 20 years old or older than 55 years old; have recently suffered a definite trauma; have had a tumor of any kind; need long-term hormone treatment (such as some autoimmune diseases); have had drug abuse, poor immune function or have AIDS. At the same time, from the perspective of low back pain symptoms, there are many red warning signs that need to be highly concerned, such as: persistent low back pain that gradually worsens and cannot be relieved by bed rest, and even waking up with pain at night; systemic diseases, with discomfort elsewhere in the body in addition to low back pain; low back pain with abnormal neurological functions (such as abnormal urinary and fecal functions), unexplained continuous weight loss; low back pain accompanied by chest pain or elevated body temperature. On top of this, if the orthopedic surgeon finds a spinal deformity or severe restriction of bending activities during the physical examination, the patient needs to be further examined to avoid misdiagnosis or omission and delay. In addition to the red warnings given by the body, there are also some yellow warnings in the diagnosis of low back pain that should not be ignored. If these yellow warnings are not taken seriously, it may lead to the gradual deterioration of low back pain or even long-term chronic low back pain affecting work and life. The common yellow warnings include personal factors, psychological factors and occupational factors. Personal factors such as poor physical fitness, lack of exercise or long-term smoking; psychological factors include patients with varying degrees of negative emotions (frustration, depression or high hopes for treatment), occupational factors include patients engaged in manual labor often requiring bending and twisting of the back, operating vibrating tools (such as impact drills, long-term driving also falls into this category), long-term engagement in high-risk and high-stress High-risk and high-stress jobs, etc. Low back pain is not terrible, but when low back pain is combined with red or yellow warnings and cannot be cured by conventional treatment, attention should be paid to raising vigilance and early consultation and treatment to avoid delaying the condition, delaying treatment and aggravating the condition.