Back pain is rarely as dangerous as it feels, except when it is
The BBC on singer Talia Dean’s greatly delayed diagnosis of inflammatory back pain, a type of back pain that can cause severe disability: “Talia Dean: ‘My back pain was misdiagnosed for 15 years — now I can’t dance’.”
“You just make all these excuses, you know the whole world has a back ache, so I didn’t really think anything of it.” ~@taliadean
If you’re worried about your back pain, learn the red flags for more serious causes. Almost all the more serious causes of back pain have relatively clear signs and symptoms, especially over time. If you’re still not sure, go to a doctor, and push to make sure ominous causes actually get eliminated. There’s no reason, ever, why a doctor shouldn’t be willing to try to definitively eliminate such causes — if the back pain is severe and chronic, thorough investigation is always justified.