Lately it seems like we are stuck in a feedback loop: yet another study has found a common treatment modality for acute low back pain to be much less effective than assumed. In this case, medical researchers found that low dose oral corticosteroids (i.e. prednisone) did not improve pain and offered only modest functional improvement among patients suffering from acute sciatica due to a herniated lumbar disk. According to lead author Harley Goldberg, DO, a spine care specialist at Kaiser Permanente's San Jose Medical Center, "[t]hese findings suggest that a short course of oral steroids (prednisone) is unlikely to provide much benefit for patients with sciatica due to a herniated disk in the lower back.” Researchers also found that “oral steroids did not reduce the likelihood of undergoing surgery in the year following steroid treatment.” Given the apparently modest benefits of oral steroid treatment for acute sciatica and the known deleterious effects of negative treatment history, it would seem prudent for researchers to verify the results of the study as soon as possible. Otherwise we will all be stuck paying for treatment that doesn’t work and could possibly render later treatment modalities less effective.
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