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Musculoskeletal and Sports Medicine

Shear Wave Speed as a Biomarker for Chronic Low Back Pain (CLBP) Subjects with Thoracolumbar Fascia (TLF) Glide Impairment

Thursday, October 23, 2025
12:45 PM - 2:15 PM MT
Location: Kiosk 8
Disclosure(s):
Faheem Farooq, OMSIII: No financial relationships to disclose
Matthew Chung, DO, CAQSM, R-MSK, FAOASM: No financial relationships to disclose
Albert Kozar, DO: No financial relationships to disclose
Background and/or Objectives: Aim 1: Shear wave speed at key TLF transition zones may serve as a biomarker for CLBP subjects compared to those without pain. Aim 2: Pilot arm testing whether Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment (OMT) or Hydrodissection of the posterior TLF layer will decrease shear wave speed in TLF locations identified as biomarkers.

Design: Prospective Cohort study

Setting : VCOM Sports & Osteopathic Medicine

Participants : 40 men and women from a convenience sample were assigned to CLBP (n=24) or no low back pain (NLBP) (n=16) groups.

Interventions: SWE measurements (SuperSonic MACH 30) were recorded at 23 key TLF transition zones in all subjects. After baseline measurements, OMT or Hydrodissection was performed on three occasions at two-week intervals on CLBP subjects found to have either active or passive glide impairment, measured on Ultrasound cine loops (GE LOGIQ S8). To date, five subjects have completed two, four, six, and twelve-week post treatment reevaluation.

Main Outcome Measures: Shear Wave speed and TLF glide impairment.

Results: Six TLF transition zones demonstrated statistically significant differences in SWE stiffness between CLBP and NLBP subjects at baseline. These transition zones included left latissimus dorsi transverse, left S2 vertical, midline S2, right L3 horizontal, right S2 vertical, and right PSIS vertical. CLBP subjects with TLF glide impairment showed statistically significant increased stiffness in 3 locations compared to CLBP subjects without glide impairment. Though not statistically significant, there was a consistent decrease in average SWE speed at several TLF transitions between baseline and 12-week post treatment scans.

Conclusions: This preliminary report of an ongoing study suggests that SWE can demonstrate statistically significant increases in TLF stiffness in both CLBP subjects compared with NLBP, and between CLBP subjects with glide impairment, compared to those without. Thus, SWE may be a potential biomarker for TLF involvement in CLBP. Post treatment SWE scans are currently limited in interpretation by sample size.