For elderly patients with back pain, many guidelines allow imaging studies to be performed without waiting several weeks. Jeffrey G. Jarvik from the University of Washington in Seattle (USA) and colleagues recently conducted a prospective cohort study involving several thousand people aged 65 years or older who had a first visit to a primary care facility between 2011 and 2013 for the aforementioned complaints.

According to a publication in the 17 March issue of The Journal of American Medical Association, 22 per cent had early X-rays and 7 per cent had magnetic resonance imaging or CT scans. After one year, the two groups did not differ in the results obtained by the disability questionnaire from patients who did not undergo such examinations. These results imply that the imaging methods in question have uncertain value in older people with back pain.