We have developed a simple procedure for assigning persistent low back pain
patients to one of four mutually exclusive, hierarchically organized class
es. The procedure relies on the spatial distribution of a patient's pain an
d the results of straight leg raise tests to make the assignment, We have a
pplied the procedure to a large group of patients who sought treatment for
persistent LBP at several university affiliated tertiary care clinics, and
found that the resulting four classes of patients ware significantly differ
ent from one another in their presentation, and in the way they were evalua
ted and treated by physicians. We concluded that the procedure may have pra
ctical research and clinical applications. (C) 2000 international Associati
on for the Study of Pain. Published. by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights re
served.