HOME HEALTH GUIDE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 12 November 1943, Page 6

HOME HEALTH GUIDE

THE MEANING OF BACKACHE A SYMPTOM OF DISORDER (By the Department of Health) Probably no other form of pain gives rise to more “imaginative troubles” than backache. And there is probably no region of the body where it is harder for diagnosis to find the right cause among so many possible causes. It is a complex problem. The doctor knows that this symptom may indicate one of a great many disorders or diseases, of which the following are only a few: Gastric ulcer, duodenal ulcer, dyspepsia, gall-stones, disease of the uterus or associated organs, disease of the bladder or the lower bowel, fibrositis (of which one form is lumbago), disease of the spinal cord itself, or arthritis. There’s some of them — an unpleasant collection. The treatment of backache is the treatment of its cause, and the discovery of its cause is the job for an experienced doctor. Various physical measures for the relief of pain may be followed, but if you suffer at all from backache, you may be sure there's a good reason for it. Let your doctor find the reason. As with every other complaint, early diagnosis is half the battle. No mention of kidneys has been made in reference to backache, for the reason that it is comparatively rarely that pain in the back is caused by kidney disease. When pain does originate there, it is more likely to be felt in some part of the abdomen, even in the groin, than in the back. If backache is severe and persistent it must be treated, and to be treated properly the diagnosis must be accurate.