Diagnostic Approach to Back Pain
Oct 05, 2021Back pain — it’s truly one of the most common issues you come across in primary care. That’s why you need to have your diagnostic approach to it down pat as a nurse practitioner.
And the sooner you get comfortable diagnosing back pain in primary care, the sooner you’ll feel confident helping your patients on their road to recovery.
Diagnosing Back Pain in Primary Care
In this week’s episode, we talk about why you should really take a triage-based approach to back pain — among other chief complaints — plus other hot takes on assessing back pain such as:
- Red flags that are critical — if sometimes tricky — to uncover when taking a patient history
- Key tests to consider when you're doing a physical exam
- Should you order imaging or further testing?
- And how to advise patients and set expectations for recovery