ArticleScientific reports2022
Correlation between gene expression and MRI STIR signals in patients with chronic low back pain and Modic changes indicates immune involvement.
Article in Scientific reports, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- Immune-neural crosstalk in chronic low back pain: from intervertebral disc degeneration to pain sensitization.Frontiers in immunology · 2026Review
- Gene Expression Correlates with Disability and Pain Intensity in Patients with Chronic Low Back Pain and Modic Changes in a Sex-Specific Manner.International journal of molecular sciences · 2025Article
- Theoretical Schemas to Guide Back Pain Consortium (BACPAC) Chronic Low Back Pain Clinical Research.Pain medicine (Malden, Mass.) · 2023Review
- Long-Term Use of Amoxicillin Is Associated with Changes in Gene Expression and DNA Methylation in Patients with Low Back Pain and Modic Changes.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Modic changes as seen on MRI are associated with nonspecific chronic lower back pain and disability.Journal of orthopaedic surgery and research · 2023Review
- Using Machine Learning to Predict Surgical Site Infection After Lumbar Spine Surgery.Infection and drug resistance · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
18 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Disability and distress caused by chronic low back pain (LBP) lacking clear pathoanatomical explanations cause huge problems both for patients and society. A subgroup of patients has Modic changes (MC), identifiable by MRI as vertebral bone marrow lesions. The cause of such changes and their relationship to pain are not yet understood. We explored the pathobiology of these lesions using profiling of gene expression in blood, coupled with an edema-sensitive MRI technique known as short tau inversion recovery (STIR) imaging. STIR images and total RNA from blood were collected from 96 patients with chronic LBP and MC type I, the most inflammatory MC state. We found the expression of 37 genes significantly associated with STIR signal volume, ten genes with edema abundancy (a constructed combination of STIR signal volume, height, and intensity), and one gene with expression levels significantly associated with maximum STIR signal intensity. Gene sets related to interferon signaling, mitochondrial metabolism and defense response to virus were identified as significantly enriched among the upregulated genes in all three analyses. Our results point to inflammation and immunological defense as important players in MC biology in patients with chronic LBP.
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