Innovative Treatments for Back Pain "Innovation involves asking new questions, or taking new approaches to old questions. For a problem as old as back pain, one might expect innovations to be rare. That back pain has been the most burdensome non-fatal health condition for over 25 years, and that the treatments that are available are not very effective, clearly points to the need for innovative approaches. The most eye-catching innovations of the last decade have taken novel approaches to the intervertebral disk, but the disconnect between back pain and structural pathology of the spine suggest that the impact of any so targeted approaches will be limited. Other innovations include channeling patients to treatments based on their presentation rather than on any specific structural diagnosis; targeting disruption of brain-grounded bodily representations of the back rather than the back itself; theory-led enhancement of established treatments by interventions aimed at the supposed mechanisms of those treatments; and pre-emptive population level reconceptualization of the underlying biology and meaning of back pain. Possible future innovations are discussed."
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