Jeff Langmaid (chiropractor) introduces a review of evidence about spinal osteoarthritis, emphasizing that diagnosing spinal OA is challenging because research lacks agreed diagnostic criteria. He notes chiropractors commonly use imaging signs (osteophytes, degenerative changes, Modic changes) and states the study will assess whether those indicators are supported by available evidence.
Spinal osteoarthritis is really difficult to study and diagnose because there's no agreement on the diagnostic criteria. Now, as a chiropractor, you might listen to that and say, I see osteoarthritis on my images all day, every day. As a matter of fact, most images, when it's above a 30 year old, I see some form of osteoarthritis. You're 100% correct. But that does not mean that everybody else on planet Earth agrees. And in the research world, there is absolutely no agreement on the diagnostic criteria. It's all over the place. So we are coached and trained and taught as chiropractors to look for things like osteophytes, to look for degenerative changes, to look for modic changes, to look for all of these items that we associate with osteoarthritis. Well, this paper is going to take a look and say, well, is that actually true or not? Based upon the available evidence? And that is what this research study attempted to do.
