The Ability of Chronic Pain Patients to Self-diagnose Their Chief Source of Low Back Pain
Northwestern University
Summary
The investigative team will provide 27 slides with bullet points and images of pain referral patterns for different causes (e.g., herniated disc, facet joint arthritis) for patients seen for a new visit with a chief complaint of chronic low back pain. This material is all publicly available but has been compiled in presentation form. This will have educational benefit for patients, discussing clinical signs and symptoms, risk factors and basic treatments. There will also be a smaller control group of that gets a condensed 4-slide presentation. After review of the slides, an independent observer will ask the patient what they think are the 2 most likely causes of their LBP (in order of likelihood) and match that with the attending physician and trainee, who will independently do the same. The investigative team will then determine how concordant the patient's answers are with the physicians and also record outcomes.
Description
Artificial intelligence (AI), the growth of the internet and internet access, direct-to-patient advertising, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic with a proliferation of telehealth visits has transformed medicine. Patients come in with a wealth of information, some accurate but some inaccurate, about their condition, often with preconceived notions about what condition they have and how they want to be treated. For conditions such as chronic pain with a high prevalence rate of abnormal imaging findings in asymptomatic individuals, the absence of biomarkers for clear-cut diagnoses, and subje…
Eligibility
- Age range
- 18+ years
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- No
Inclusion Criteria: * • Age \> 18 years * Primary complaint of LBP or sciatica * Duration of LBP \> 3 months Exclusion Criteria: * • Referral for a specific diagnostic procedure or who present with a pre-established diagnosis * Inability to understand written English
Interventions
- BehavioralControl
Brief 4-slide presentation without a separate session for questions and answers
- BehavioralEducation
Patients will review 27 slides that discuss the different etiologies (causes) of back pain, how common they are, what causes them (e.g., wear and tear, trauma), factors that exacerbate and alleviate the pain, how they are diagnosed and treated, and have an opportunity to ask questions.
Location
- Northwestern University Pain Management CenterChicago, Illinois