A recent article in the Daily Mail reported that studies have shown that an antidepressant called Duloxetine may help reduce chronic low back pain and there have been several studies over the past few years looking at the role of duloxetine in pain management. In addition to treating depression, it is already licensed in [...]
Krithik Ramesh, a 16 year old boy from Colorado, USA has just won first prize (and $75,000) at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair with a spinal surgical navigational tool where more than 1,800 teens from 80 countries presented their inventions and projects. Krithik came up with the idea whilst trying to improve his [...]
Last week I gave a one hour interactive lecture to a great group of people at the BMI Harbour Hospital. My audience were members of the public who all asked excellent questions resulting in a lively event discussing spinal anatomy, spinal conditions and potential treatments. I really enjoyed meeting everyone but I also found [...]
I have just spent the past 4 days at the British Association of Spinal Surgeons 2019 Conference which was an excellent event. As a member of the executive committee I was involved in the organisation of the meeting, giving some lectures and hosting discussions but more importantly I was able to attend some great [...]
I felt it was appropriate, and interesting, to write about the positive effects of exercise and low back pain as a follow up to the report on the causal link of sitting for long periods and low back pain. If you needed another reason to exercise, a 2016 study showed that exercise alone has [...]
Many studies, including a recent study published in the ‘The Spine Journal’ have shown a causal link between sitting time and low back pain. Low back pain is the most common musculoskeletal problem in the world and it is estimated that up to 80% of the general population will have back pain [...]
Recently there has been a lot in the news about opioid addiction, abuse and its negative effects especially in the USA. Opiates are a family of drugs that are naturally derived from opium from the poppy plant. Opioids are both the natural and synthetically produced drugs. They work by triggering the release of the [...]
Last week I wrote about an exciting new technology that is using 3-D printers to make implants or ‘scaffolding’ that is being used in research for a method to repair spinal cord injuries. Since then I have seen the paper published in the ‘Nature Medicine’ Journal titled ‘Biomimetic 3D-printed scaffolds for spinal cord injury [...]
There has been a lot of studies and articles in the press about the use of Virtual Reality (VR) therapies as a clinical tool to manage both acute and chronic pain and I think this is very interesting. The theory is that patients suffering from uncontrollable pain can immerse themselves into an interactive virtual [...]
In the ‘Good Health’ Section of the Daily Maily, 22/01/19, there was an article about an incredibly exciting new technology that could potentially change the lives of patient’s with spinal cord injuries. Spinal cord injuries can result in patients being paralysed, doubly incontinent and in some cases are fatal. Scientists at the University of California [...]
