What it is
Lumbar discs lose water content and height with age, the outer ring develops small tears, and load transfers to the facet joints behind. The term sounds like a progressive illness and is better understood as a description of normal change.
The clinical difficulty is that this change is nearly universal, so finding it on a scan tells you very little about why a particular person's back hurts.
Symptoms
- Aching across the lower back, often worse with sitting, bending or lifting
- Stiffness in the morning that eases with movement
- Pain that flares for days or weeks and then settles
- Where a degenerating segment narrows a nerve exit: leg symptoms
How it is diagnosed
X-rays show lost disc height and any instability on flexion and extension views. MRI shows the discs and the nerves. Where back pain is the main complaint and a specific disc is suspected, a diagnostic injection can be more informative than any scan — because it tests whether numbing that structure takes the pain away.
Non-surgical treatment
This is where lumbar disc degeneration is treated. Staying active, structured physical therapy for the trunk and hips, weight and conditioning work, anti-inflammatory medication, and targeted injections. Most people manage well and never need an operation.
When surgery is considered
Where degeneration has caused nerve compression with leg symptoms, or genuine instability — not for the degeneration itself. If an operation is being proposed for back pain alone, it is worth understanding exactly which structure is believed to be responsible and what evidence supports that.