title: Low back pain: the controversy of radiologic evaluation.
abstract: A prospective study was performed to evaluate the efficacy of including oblique radiographs as part of a lumbar vertebral column examination. Five hundred patients in the second through ninth decades of life were evaluated. Of those, 12% had an abnormality detected on the 45 degree oblique view that was not apparent on the frontal or lateral radiographs. Those abnormalities included degenerative changes of apophyseal joints (6%), spondylolysis (4%), osteoid osteoma, anomalous apophyseal joint, and abnormal pars interarticularis (2%). These results are compared with those of other investigators and the reasons for variance are discussed.
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001416:Back Pain / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D006801:Humans; D007592:Joint Diseases / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D008159:Lumbar Vertebrae / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D008875:Middle Aged; D010017:Osteoma, Osteoid / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D011446:Prospective Studies; D011859:Radiography; D013122:Spinal Diseases / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D013125:Spinal Neoplasms / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D013169:Spondylolysis / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging