What Are the Most Common Causes of Severe Leg Pain?

Waist and leg pain is a condition with waist and leg pain as the main symptoms. Waist and leg pain is not a disease, but a group of symptoms that can be caused by a variety of reasons. Low back pain is a common occurrence, often coexisting with leg pain, and has a higher incidence among manual workers, such as porters, underground miners, woodworkers, and car drivers. It is worth noting that back and leg pain is also a common disease among those working in government agencies and working at desks for long periods of time.

Basic Information

Causes of low back pain

The common causes are as follows:

Degenerative change

The waist is subjected to various loads for a long time, which causes degenerative changes in the intervertebral joints and discs. Degeneration of intervertebral joints and discs leads to bone hyperplasia, lumbar deformity, disc herniation, and spinal stenosis. Corresponding pathological changes occur in the surrounding soft tissues, causing severe back pain.

2. Chronic strain

Fixed posture for a long time, improper lifting of heavy weights, excessive work intensity or excessive exercise, etc., cause damage to waist muscles, fascia and ligaments. These acute and chronic injuries cause spasm and degeneration of muscle fibers, tearing of ligaments, and mechanical adhesion of blood stasis.

3. Congenital developmental abnormalities

Such as congenital spina bifida, scoliosis deformity, congenital deformation and fusion of the vertebral body, lumbar vertebralization and sacral vertebralization and other structural abnormalities cause lumbar and leg pain.

4. Trauma or sequelae of surgery

After severe trauma to the waist or lumbar surgery, local structural damage affects spinal stability and causes back and leg pain.

Low back pain clinical manifestations

Acute lumbar sprain

There are many obvious history of spontaneous spinal spondylosis of the waist, back pain immediately after injury, restricted movement, obvious tenderness points on the waist, inability to change position freely, pain is spastic pain, and there is no abnormality on X-ray.

2. Lumbar muscle strain

Most of them are chronic low back pain, which occurs under fatigue and is related to climate change. The pain is mostly bloating and can be relieved after rest. X-ray films can be found without abnormalities, and deformities such as congenital spina bifida can also be found.

3. Lumbar disc herniation

There is a history of injury to the waist, radiation pain in the lower extremity of the waist, mild symptoms and severe symptoms, and limited movement. Coughing, sneezing, and bending can aggravate the symptoms, and the pain is relieved after resting. There was obvious tenderness between spinous processes or paraspinal spine, and the test of straight leg elevation was positive, and there was corresponding sensory and dyskinesia in the innervation area of the nerve root. X-rays or lumbar CT can help confirm the diagnosis.

4. Lumbar spinal stenosis

Low back pain recurred, numbness in lower limbs was weak, intermittent claudication, X-ray films or lumbar CT showed narrowing of the intervertebral space and narrowing of the inner diameter of the spinal canal.

5. Third lumbar transverse process syndrome

There is a history of sprains or strains. The third lumbar transverse process is tender and radiates down to the waist and hips. A cord or nodule can be touched near the three transverse processes.

Low back pain check

Film degree exam

(1) Plain radiographs of lumbar spinal canal lesions show narrowing of the intervertebral disc, sharpening of the posterior edge of the vertebra, sharpening of the hyperplasia, articular surface sclerosis, calcification of the posterior longitudinal ligament, and pseudo slip The intervertebral body sequence changes, and the lumbar spine is convex toward the diseased side. CT and MRI reduced disc herniation, prolapse, spinal stenosis, yellow ligament hypertrophy, vertebral body slip, and vascular malformations.

(2) The plain X-ray film of extravertebral lumbar spinal lesions showed that the degenerative changes of the disc were not consistent with the clinical signs of pain. CT and MRI showed bulging or protruding discs, hypertrophy of small joints.

Low back pain treatment

Conservative treatment

Conservative treatment of low back and leg pain includes drug therapy, bed rest, physical therapy such as various electrotherapy, magnetic therapy, phototherapy, traction, hyperthermia, exercise therapy, fumigation and so on. The advantages are safety and pain-free, but the disadvantage is that the course of treatment is relatively long. If the cause is judged accurately and the treatment method is selected properly, most patients can achieve clinical recovery.

2. Surgical treatment

Some diseases must be treated with surgery in order to remove pain, such as stenoses of the spinal canal, prolapse and intervertebral disc prolapse, and tumors. Surgical therapy has the characteristics of reliable efficacy, thorough treatment and short treatment period, but the damage is relatively large.