CHRONIC LOW-BACK-PAIN

Low-back pain is a very common disease in Switzerland as elsewhere, wi th a prevalence of 65%. The pain is usually due to degeneration of the motion segment, but subsides spontaneously in some 95% of cases irres pective of the treatment. Only 5% of patients still have pain after on e year, but account for over 80% of the costs due to low-back pain. So me patients can be helped by surgical fusion; however, preoperative id entification of the pain source is mandatory. Since there is no consis tent correlation between gain and the degree of degeneration ol: motio n segments as seen on plain radiographs, functional radiographs, CT sc an or MRI, other diagnostic methods such as facet blocs, discography a nd external diagnostic fixation must be used. After careful patient se lection a fusion operation may be considered. Good results after fusio n operations are reported in 60-80% of patients. The operative techniq ues are described.