Conditions · Carrollwood · Tampa Bay
Spinal Bone Spurs & Osteophytes
What osteophyte, spondylosis, and disc-osteophyte complex mean on your report, what they do and do not tell you, and how a doctor trained in spinal MRI interpretation connects the picture to the person.
Somewhere in your report there is a word nobody translated for you: osteophyte, spondylosis, uncovertebral spurring, disc-osteophyte complex. So at eleven at night you type it into a search bar, and the internet answers badly. This page is the translator. Dr. Bobby Koser, DC, chiropractic physician, completed post-doctoral training in spinal MRI interpretation and clinical correlation, and reading the report with the person it belongs to is part of the examination here. Bring yours.
Spinal Bone Spurs Overview
What the words on your report mean
Your spine is a stack of bones called vertebrae, one vertebra at each level, with a disc between each pair as a cushion and a pair of joints at the back that guide how you move. Reports name the region first, cervical for the neck, thoracic for the mid-back, lumbar for the low back, then the level, like C5-C6 or L4-L5. Almost every term below describes extra bone along an edge somewhere in that stack, and most are the same finding in different vocabulary.
Bone spur, or osteophyte
A rim or lip of extra bone along the edge of a vertebra, or of one of the joints between vertebrae. Osteophyte is the medical word for it, so a report saying osteophyte and a doctor saying bone spur mean one thing. Reports also write spurring, osteophyte formation, or osteophytosis when several levels are named.
Also written as: bone spurs on the spine, vertebral osteophytosis, bony proliferation, bony overgrowth. Calcium deposit on the spine is a conversational phrase rather than a term that appears on a report.
Spondylosis
A broad radiology word for a pattern across a region of the spine, usually some mix of disc height loss, spurring along the bone edges, and change in the joints at the back. It names a pattern rather than one structure, which is why a report adds the levels. Cervical spondylosis means the pattern is described in the neck, lumbar spondylosis in the low back.
Also written as: spondylosis deformans, degenerative spurring, hypertrophic spurring, hypertrophic degenerative changes.
Endplate spurring, and endplate sclerosis
The endplate is the flat cap of bone at the top and bottom of each vertebra, the surface the disc sits against. Endplate spurring means extra bone at the rim of that cap. Endplate sclerosis means the bone there reads denser and brighter on the image, a description of how it looks rather than a separate diagnosis.
Also written as: marginal osteophytes, anterior osteophytes (front edge), posterior osteophytes (back edge), traction spur, traction osteophyte.
Disc-osteophyte complex
One phrase for disc material and bone spurring sitting together at the same level, described as a single shape instead of two findings. It turns up most often on neck MRI reports. If your report also carries disc words like protrusion, extrusion, or bulge, those are translated on our herniated disc and bulging disc page.
Also written as: osteophyte complex, bony ridging, osteophytic ridging.
Uncovertebral spurring, and bone spurs in the neck
The uncovertebral joints are paired joints along the sides of the neck vertebrae, right beside the openings where nerve roots leave the spine. They are also called the joints of Luschka, and the bony ridge each sits on is the uncinate process. Uncovertebral or uncinate spurring means extra bone at the edges of those joints, and hypertrophy, meaning enlargement, is used for the same area. Reports often name the nearby opening, the neuroforamen, in the same line.
Also written as: uncovertebral hypertrophy, uncinate hypertrophy, cervical bone spurs, neck bone spurs.
Words that look like spondylosis but are not
Spondylolysis is a break in a bridge of bone at the back of a vertebra. Spondylolisthesis is one vertebra sitting forward of the one beneath it. Spondylitis is inflammation of the spinal joints. Only spondylosis belongs to the family of words on this page, and all four get read off reports interchangeably.
A finding is not a diagnosis
Two things are true at once. A bone spur named on your report is not automatically the cause of what you feel, so building a plan around the picture can mean treating the wrong thing. And your pain is not less real because the same word appears on other people’s reports.
Being told you have a bone spur does not settle what is causing your pain, and it does not mean your pain is imagined. A UK population survey took plain X-rays of the spine in 499 men and 681 women aged 50 and over. In that survey, 84% of men and 74% of women had at least one spinal level with an osteophyte graded 1 or higher on a 0 to 4 scale.1 In that same survey, self-reported back pain, both ever and in the past year, was linked with lumbar bone spurs in men.
A second review comes at the question from the other end, and reads two ways as well: a spur named on a report does not by itself identify the source of your pain, and your pain is not less real because the same word appears on other people’s reports. That review pooled 28 studies and 26,107 people, all on plain X-rays of the lower back alongside low back pain. In that review, the authors described the link between low back pain and osteophytes and spondylosis as modest, and the link for endplate sclerosis, meaning hardening of the bone surface next to a disc, and for facet joint changes as non-significant.2 They did report a significant association for disc space narrowing, meaning less height in the cushion between two spine bones (odds ratio 1.47, 95% confidence interval 1.36 to 1.58, a comparison between groups and its range of statistical uncertainty, not a number about any one person, in community-based studies).
Both describe groups of people, on plain X-rays, in the populations they studied. Neither can say whether the finding on your report explains your symptoms, and neither can rule it out. The report is the starting point. The exam connects it to you.
1. O’Neill TW, et al. The distribution, determinants, and clinical correlates of vertebral osteophytosis: a population based survey. J Rheumatol. 1999;26(4):842-848. PubMed
2. Raastad J, et al. The association between lumbar spine radiographic features and low back pain: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Semin Arthritis Rheum. 2015;44(5):571-585. PubMed
Where a spur sits, and what is next to it
The location in your report carries more information than the word itself. Extra bone at the front edge of the vertebral bodies sits away from the spinal canal, the tube the spinal cord runs through. Extra bone at the back edge sits near that canal. Extra bone beside a neuroforamen, one of the openings on each side where a nerve root leaves the spine and heads for your arm or your leg, sits near that root. That is why a report names a side and a level rather than stopping at the word.
Reports also use stenosis, which means narrowing, for the canal or for one of those openings. Spurring described next to a narrowed space is a shape and a distance on an image. It is not deciding what is generating your symptoms, and it cannot, because it never met you.
Whether a nerve is actually involved is answered by testing the nerve: where your symptoms travel, and what your reflexes, strength, and sensation show at the level and side named on the report. When it lines up, the finding has earned its place in the plan. When it does not, the plan follows the examination, which is why the Pain Source Exam comes before treatment here.
Symptoms, and the warning signs we screen for
Pain and stiffness can stay local, most often in the neck or the low back. When a nerve root is involved, symptoms travel instead: pain, tingling, or numbness running down an arm from the neck, or down a leg, the pattern many people know as sciatica. Weakness in a hand or a foot points the same way, and changes what the examination looks for.
Common, and examined here
- Neck or back pain with spurring or spondylosis named on a report
- Stiffness or lost motion in the neck or the low back
- Pain, tingling, or numbness traveling into an arm or a leg
- Neck pain with headaches at the base of the skull
- An X-ray or MRI report nobody has ever explained to you
Emergency, not an appointment
- New loss of bowel or bladder control
- Numbness in the groin, buttocks, or inner thighs
- Rapidly worsening weakness in a leg, an arm, or a hand
- New clumsiness in the hands: dropping things, trouble with buttons or a key
- A new change in how you walk, unsteadiness, or legs that do not do what you tell them
- An electric-shock sensation down your spine or into your limbs when you bend your neck forward
- Numbness or weakness on both sides of the body at once
Together these can signal pressure on the spinal cord or on the cauda equina, the bundle of nerves at the base of the spinal cord. Go to the emergency department now. This is part of what the examination here screens for.
How we approach spinal bone spurs
The examination comes first: your history, a physical and neurological examination, and your imaging report read with you, not at you. Dr. Koser’s post-doctoral training in spinal MRI interpretation and clinical correlation exists for exactly this conversation, and years of helping flag potential surgical spine cases for referral, alongside neurosurgeons, came before this practice. Whether spurring on your film belongs in the plan depends on whether the examination finds it is generating your symptoms.
When conservative care fits, it is built from what the examination found and aimed at how the area moves and how you feel, not at the appearance of the bone on a film: gentle techniques such as flexion-distraction, which stretches the spine slowly with no thrust, and instrument adjusting, dry needling for the muscles guarding the area, and a plan for movement you can actually follow, monitored so the plan changes if you do not.
Some presentations belong somewhere else first. Signs that point to the spinal cord, weakness that is measurably worse from one visit to the next, trouble or pain with swallowing or a new change in your voice alongside spurring at the front of the neck, new spine pain with fever, night pain, unexplained weight loss, or a history of cancer, any new injury with bony findings that have not been read for fracture: those get a referral to the right physician and your records sent with you. Surgery decisions belong with surgeons. Making sure you are in the right room is part of the job here. More on how the whole region is worked up is on our spine care page.
Hurt in a car accident? Spine findings after a crash run through a different door: Florida’s PIP law requires care to begin within 14 days. Start at our auto accident page.
Common questions about spinal bone spurs
My X-ray says I have a bone spur. Is that what is causing my pain?
Not automatically, and your pain is not less real because a spur is named on your film. In a UK population survey of adults 50 and over with plain X-rays of the spine, 84% of men and 74% of women had at least one spinal level with an osteophyte graded 1 or higher on a 0 to 4 scale, and in that same survey self-reported back pain was linked with lumbar bone spurs in men. Whether yours explains your symptoms is what the examination works out.
What is the difference between a bone spur and an osteophyte?
Vocabulary. Osteophyte is the medical word, bone spur is the everyday one, and both name a rim or lip of extra bone along the edge of a vertebra or one of the spinal joints. Spurring, osteophyte formation, osteophytosis, and bony proliferation are the same finding again, written for a different reader.
My report says spondylosis. Does that mean I have arthritis in my spine?
Not exactly. Spondylosis is a radiology term for a pattern across a region of the spine, usually some mix of disc height loss, spurring along the bone edges, and change in the joints at the back. Arthritis of the spine is a phrase used for changes in those joints specifically. A report can describe both, one, or neither. The level and side it names tell you more than the label.
What does disc-osteophyte complex mean on my MRI?
Disc material and bone spurring sitting together at the same level, described as one shape instead of two findings. You will see it most often on neck MRI reports, sometimes written as bony ridging. If your report also uses words like protrusion or extrusion, those are explained on our herniated disc page.
Can a bone spur pinch a nerve?
Reports do describe extra bone sitting beside the openings where nerve roots leave the spine, and sometimes describe those openings as narrowed. What that means for you is settled by testing the nerve, not by reading the sentence: where your symptoms travel, what your reflexes, strength, and sensation show, and whether those line up with the level and side on the report.
What can be done about a bone spur on the spine?
Removal is a surgical question, and surgical questions belong with a surgeon. Conservative care here is aimed at how the area moves and how you feel rather than at the shape of the bone on a film. What the examination answers first is whether the finding explains your symptoms at all. That decides what happens next, including whether a surgical opinion is worth getting.
I was in a car accident and my imaging showed bone spurs. Can a report tell you whether the crash is why I hurt?
A report describes what is on the image. It does not tell you when anything began. The whole record answers that: what you could do before the crash, what changed, what a physical and neurological examination documents now, and how you respond over a monitored course of care. Your examination here is built to produce it. Under Florida’s PIP law, care has to begin within 14 days of the crash.
Do bone spurs on the spine mean I need surgery?
That is not something a report decides. The examination works out whether the finding explains your symptoms, and whether anything calls for a surgical opinion: measurable weakness, signs that point to the spinal cord, or a picture that does not add up. If it does, we say so, refer you, and send your records with you. If not, we start with a monitored trial of conservative care.
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This page is general health information and is not medical advice for any individual. The studies summarized describe groups, not any one person’s outcome, and whether any finding on your imaging explains your symptoms can only be determined by examination. Talk to Dr. Bobby Koser, DC, about your own situation, and seek emergency care immediately for the warning signs listed above.
Bring the report. Leave with it explained.
A complete examination with Dr. Bobby Koser, DC, your imaging report reviewed with you, and your findings explained the same day.