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Facet Syndrome
Facets are small joints along the back of the spine.
They bear little weight, but help prevent forward slippage of one vertebra
on another. They commonly become arthritic and with age and as people
age they have more back pain. Several years ago this association was
thought to be cause and effect and was called facet syndrome. However,
we now know that there is no association between facet arthritis and
back pain – see: There is no test to diagnose facet syndrome. It is suspected when twisting the spine hurts and no herniated disc or other obvious cause of back pain is found. Some say injecting local anesthetic into the facet diagnoses facet syndrome is the pain is relieved. However, this is a somewhat circular definition, like defining the sun as a star that shines by day. But what is day? It’s when the sun shines. For more
discussion on diagnosis and treatment of facet syndrome, see the section
on Pain Management on the left menu. |