Is Chronic Neck Pain Associated With Disc Degeneration in The Young Population? A Perspective From The Modified Grading System on Cervical Disc Degeneration
In order to investigate whether the chronic neck pain is associated with cervical disc degeneration, a
case-control study was carried out. To facilitate statistical analysis, it is necessary to quantify the degree
of cervical intervertebral disc degeneration using a grading system. Therefore, a modified grading
system for cervical disc degeneration was proposed based on cervical magnetic resonance image (MRI).
Several doctors were invited to review the images on two separate occasions and classify the cervical
disc degeneration grades of all subjects according to the new grading method. The intra-observer
agreement for this new grading system was excellent (K>0.8), and the inter-observer agreement was
substantial (K>0.6). There was no significant difference in the distribution of cervical disc degeneration
grades between the two groups (P=0.863>0.05). The new cervical disc degeneration grading system
demonstrates excellent reliability and suggests there is no correlation between the occurrence of CNP
and disc degeneration.
