Acute back pain

Back pain will affect 60–80% of the population in industrialized countries. The majority of back pain (90%) will settle in 6 weeks. For most patients, keeping active and optimal pain control with regular simple analgesics will suffice. This article describes how to identify ‘red flags’ indicative of serious spinal pathology in patients with back pain, how to assess for markers of chronicity (‘yellow flags’) and when to refer for further investigation and specialist input.