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Patients forced to live in agony after NHS refuses to pay for painkilling injections

(Telegraph 01/08/2009)

The Government's drug rationing watchdog says "therapeutic" injections of steroids, such as cortisone, which are used to reduce inflammation, should no longer be offered to patients suffering from persistent lower back pain when the cause is not known. Instead the NICE is ordering doctors to offer patients remedies like acupuncture and osteopathy. Specialists fear tens of thousands of people, mainly the elderly and frail, will be left to suffer excruciating levels of pain.

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Exercise therapy

(BBC 09/11/2008)

Yoga has long been considered beneficial to the body, but could it be a cure for lower-back pain? A large trial is to test how lower-back pain responds to a 12-week course of yoga therapy. More than 300 people in five centres across England have been recruited for the York University trial and each participant will be monitored for a year afterwards.

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The man who spent '£3,000 trying to cure back pain - and is still in agony

(Daily Mail 13/09/2008)

From osteopathy to injections and Pilates to 'Masai warrior' shoes, one writer tried almost anything to ease his misery.

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Apprentice star Claire Young: 'My killer high heels wrecked my spine - and left me in agony'

(Daily Mail 25/08/2008)

Apprentice finalist Claire Young strutted to television fame wearing her trademark four-inch high-heeled shoes - but the footware left her unable to move and frozen in agony.

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