Whether to order an MRI scan or not for patients with low back and leg pain (LBP). Resources are limited. Waiting for diagnostic imaging impacts time to treatment and may be critical to the “18 week target”. We have looked into devising a system in which we can ordered MRI scans for patients with LBP pre-clinical assessment based on questionnaire and accessing their referral letter. 49 patient's referrals were looked into (randomly picked). 23 had a questionnaire filled by either themselves or their GPs. the rests had MRI scans ordered based on their referral letters. MRI scans were requested pre-clinical assessment for patients with symptoms spreading beyond their knees and willing to consider interventional treatments (injections or operations). We considered MRI positive if the report mentioned stenosis or disc prolapse causing nerve root or cauda compression. 7 out of the 23 fitted the criteria for MRI. 6 (85%) of them had positive results. 26 of the GP referrals letters had MRI out of those 16 (61%) had positive results. In total out of 33 MRI, 22 (66.7%) were positive.Purpose and background
Methods and results
