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6 Questions to Ask Your Doctor About Back Pain

Print this page, take it to your appointment, ask the questions in order, and write the answers in the margin. Ask for exercise advice specific enough to follow at home.

If an emergency sign on the red-flag checklist applies, go to emergency care now instead of waiting for this appointment. For the other signs on it, see a clinician today. Tell the clinician about every new or changing symptom.

• Based on my history and exam, am I cleared to start a strength program that loads my lower back? Clearance

  Say you are thinking about a 45-degree back-extension bench program that starts with short holds and adds load slowly. A useful answer is yes, no with a reason, or yes with limits you can write down. "Stay active" is good advice, but it does not answer this question.

• What do you think is contributing to my pain, and what is still uncertain? Cause

  Ask what the history and exam showed and how sure the clinician is. A working explanation can change as you see how you respond.

• Does anything on my exam or scan limit how I load my back? Scans

  Ask which findings matter for you and which are common age-related changes. If there is a restriction, ask what it is, how long it lasts, and when it will be reviewed. If there is none, ask them to say so.

• Which symptoms mean I stop and contact you, and how fast? Stop signs

  Ask for the warning signs in their own words, and what to do about ordinary soreness after training. This program stops the back-extension work when pain goes into the legs. Ask whether that fits your case, who to call, and how quickly.

• If I handle the starting dose, can it go up while my next-morning pain stays near my usual level? Progression

  This program raises one thing at a time: hold time, then range, then reps, then weight, paced by how you feel the next morning. Ask which to change first, what to watch for, and what to do after a clear rise in pain.

• Do I need another scan, injection, or treatment before I start, and why now? Other treatment

  For any scan, injection, manipulation, medicine, or referral, ask what it is meant to change, the likely benefit and risks, the alternatives, and when you will review it. If the answer is that you can start, write that down.

Bring a short history

Write down when this episode began, where the pain goes, what has changed recently, and what daily tasks it makes harder. Include past diagnoses, scans, treatments, medicines, other health conditions, and how you did with exercise before. If you track pain or activity, bring a typical week, not only your best or worst day.

If you use the app, it can make a PDF report for the visit: your baseline, 30-day pain averages, sessions, and stage, with a note to the clinician about the program. It is your own logged data, not a medical record.

If they want to see the evidence

NICE's back-pain guideline recommends advice to keep up normal activities, suggests a group exercise program for an episode or flare-up, and says imaging should not be offered routinely outside specialist care. A 2015 meta-analysis of randomized trials found the clearest benefit in chronic low back pain for strength or resistance and coordination or stabilisation programs. A 2015 review of isolated lumbar-extension training reported improvements in pain and disability, and found few head-to-head comparisons with other exercise. Strength-training guidance for healthy adults adds load in small steps, about 2 to 10 percent, once you can do 1 or 2 reps more than the target. None of these tested this site's bench progression.

Before you leave

Read back what you heard: the starting activity, any limits, how it progresses, the warning signs, and when you will follow up. If you are cleared, the program is the loaded 45-degree back-extension progression, paced by the next morning. Floor work is only for the time before you have a bench. The home-exercise guide helps when a printed exercise sheet has become easy, and the treatment guide covers what the trials found for other care.

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