Back Pain with Red Flags course for GPs

This session discusses the common causes of serious pathology in back pain and the red flags that patients present with that would increase your clinical suspicion. Common signs and symptoms are presented.

This session was reviewed by Khyati Bakhai and last updated in January 2020.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this session you will be able to:

• Recognise back pain due to serious spinal pathology (red flags)
• State the symptoms suggestive of serious spinal pathology
• Refer patients with red flags appropriately to secondary care colleagues
• Describe the use of imaging modalities available in a patient presenting with one or more red flags

This session starts with an overview of the concept of red flags in general. It then moves on to look at the common red flags in various age groups, using case histories.