Use painkillers cautiously, doctors and patients advised

Analgesics such as paracetamol are widely used to treat acute non-specific low back pain. — AFP

Despite nearly 60 years of research, there is still a lack of high certainty evidence on the effectiveness and safety of commonly used painkillers (analgesics) for short bouts of low back pain, finds an analysis of the evidence published by The BMJ.

The researchers say that until higher quality trials comparing analgesics with each other are published, “clinicians and patients are advised to take a cautious approach to manage acute non-specific low back pain with analgesic medicines.”