Little Arthritis in the Facet Joints

Facet Joint Osteoarthritis and Low Back Pain in the Community-Based
Population

November 7, 2008 - Medscape Today - Leonid Kalichman and etc.

To evaluate the association between lumbar spine facet joint osteoarthritis
(FJ OA) identified by multidetector computed tomography (CT) and low back
pain (LBP) in the community-based Framingham Heart Study

Results: CT imaging revealed a high prevalence of FJ OA (59.6% of males and
66.7% of females). Prevalence of FJ OA increases with age. By decade, FJ OA
was present in 24.0% of <40-years-olds,>70-years-olds. By spinal level the prevalence of FJ OA was: 15.1% at L2-L3,
30.6% at L3-L4, 45.1% at L4-L5, and 38.2% at L5-S1. In this community-based
population, individuals with FJ OA at any spinal level showed no association
with LBP.

Conclusion: There is a high prevalence of FJ OA in the community. Prevalence
of FJ OA increases with age with the highest prevalence at the L4-L5 spinal
level. At low spinal levels women have a higher prevalence of lumbar FJ OA
than men. In the present study, we failed to find an association between FJ
OA, identified by multidetector CT, at any spinal level and LBP in a
community-based study population.


(Read More)

Keywords - Arthritis, Low Back Pain,

--------------------------------------------------
Rick Kaselj - rkaselj@HealingThroughMovement.com
Registered Kinesiologist Specializing in Injury Rehabilitation
Surrey, BC, Canada
Get your "5 Myths about Core Training" Special Report -
http://www.corestabilityoftheback.com/
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------