Two Key Symptoms for Detecting Vertebral Compression Fracture among Elderly People with Acute Low Back Pain

Introduction: This study aimed to investigate whether difficulties in some motions concomitant with increased spinal loads would distinguish between patients with and without fresh vertebral compression fractures (VCFs) in elderly patients with acute low back pain.Methods: Of the 85 screened patients aged 65 years and older, 80 eligible participants were enrolled. Participants were asked about difficulties (none, slightly, and extreme) in getting up and rolling over and then divided into the VCF group or the non-VCF group after imaging examinations. A logistic regression model was used to determine whether the following variables were associated with the presence of fresh VCFs: age, sex, pain duration, pain severity, and difficulties in getting up and rolling over. Then, a multivariate stepwise logistic regression model was used to determine which variable correlated with the presence of fresh VCFs. Subsequently, we created a key symptom score for the presence of fresh VCFs, and discrimination of fresh VCFs was tested using the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve.Results: In the multivariate logistic regression analysis, difficulties in getting up (p