Randomised controlled trials of treatment are needed

doi:10.1136/bmj.311.7004.569

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Martin Underwood

Clinical scientist MRC Epidemiology and Medical Care Unit, Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine, Medical College of St Bartholomew's Hospital, London EC1M 6BQ

EDITOR,--The current interest in low back pain1 is to be welcomed, particularly in the light of the doubling of the rate of male sickness and payments of invalidity benefit for spinal disorders in the 10 years to 1991-2.2 The rate of payment of benefit, however, is an unreliable measure of the burden of back pain in the community because it principally measures long term disability, not pain and disability in those …