Author(s)

Emmanuel Chino Iyidobi, Benard Onyilo Obande, Remigius Tochukwu Ekwunife

National Orthopaedic Hospital, Enugu, Nigeria.

BACKGROUND: Low back pain is a major cause of referral to the Spine clinic. In the adult population 50% - 90% may present with low back pain at least once in their life time. Currently, the gold standard for diagnosing the etiology of low back pain is MRI. The protocol at NOHE is to request MRI for patients whose clinical patterns are indicative for invasive intervention. OBJECTIVE: To determine the pattern of MRI findings in patients with low back pain attending spine clinic at NOHE. METHODS: This is a retrospective study of 60 MRI of adult patients with low back pain with clinical need for invasive intervention. The scan was carried out with A Basda BTI 0.35T MRI System using the standard protocol, with sagital and axial T1 and T2-weighted and STIR. Images were from Onis 2.5 digital co. limited. RESULT: Thirty five (58.3%) were males while 25 (41.7%) were females with majority aged between 40 - 59 years. About 90% of the images had disc prolapse while 73% had disc height reduction. The commonest cause of spinal canal stenosis was disc prolapse, thickened ligamentum flavum, spondylolisthesis and osteophytes. Six (10%) of the patient did not have any lesion on MRI. L4/5 was the commonest affected segment while 90% of abnormal cases had multilevel involvement. CONCLUSION: There is high yield of diagnosis with MRI scan among low back pain patients with clinical need for invasive intervention, hence an excellent navigating tool. L4/L5 disc level remains the commonest culprit.

Pattern, MRI Findings, Low Back Pain, Enugu

Iyidobi, E. , Obande, B. and Ekwunife, R. (2018) Pattern of MRI Findings in Patients with Low Back Pain at National Orthopaedic Hospital, Enugu Nigeria. Journal of Biosciences and Medicines, 6, 85-94. doi: 10.4236/jbm.2018.64007.