Physiology 4530A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Lumbar Vertebrae, Synovial Joint, Fibrocartilage

• School: Western University
• Department: Physiology
• Course: Physiology 4530A/B
• Professor: Cheryl Seguin

Document Summary

Global burden of diseases study: back pain is the most common disorder: many years lost to productivity, many years lived with disability. Sometimes there is something that happens early in life (sports, mechanical loading) Low back pain is the most frequently reported musculoskeletal problem in adults. Canadians have a reported lifetime prevalence of 84%; 40% of these cases are associated with intervertebral disc degenera8on. There are symptomatic treatments, but no disease modifying therapeutics for back pain related to disc degeneration. Spine is broken up into different anatomical regions. Structures of the bones and discs in these regions are slightly different: cervical, thoracic, lumbar, sacrum and coccyx (fused in humans but not in mice because they have tails) Curvature of the spine is very important for standing upright: compare spinal structure between species and look at this evolutionarily: bipedal vs quadripedal have a different curvature to the spine, this is related to stability and being upright.