ASAS Inflammatory Back Pain Criteria
ASAS criteria for inflammatory back pain in chronic back pain: 4 of 5 items (onset under 40, insidious onset, better with exercise, not with rest, night pain).
Open the calculator → Runs in your browser. Data leaves only if you deliberately send a problem report from the interactive tool.
Example
- Back pain for 3 months or more
- Yes
- Age at onset under 40
- Yes
- Insidious onset
- Yes
- Improves with exercise
- Yes
- Does not improve with rest
- Yes
Result: Meets the ASAS criteria for inflammatory back pain: 4 of 5 (age at onset under 40, insidious onset, improvement with exercise, no improvement with rest); 4 are needed.
The tool opens with these values already filled in. Replace them with your own.
What you enter
- Back pain for 3 months or more
- Age at onset under 40
- Insidious onset
- Improves with exercise
- Does not improve with rest
- Pain at night, improving on getting up
How this is calculated
Citation
Sieper J, van der Heijde D, Landewe R, et al. New criteria for inflammatory back pain in patients with chronic back pain: a real patient exercise by experts from the Assessment of SpondyloArthritis international Society (ASAS). Ann Rheum Dis. 2009;68(6):784-788. Read the sources: Sieper 2009 ↗, Items restated 2022 ↗, DIVERS accuracy 2018 ↗
A reference and educational tool. Not medical, legal, or financial advice, and not a substitute for clinician judgment.