Physiotherapy
Lower Back Pain Physiotherapy in Singapore
Written by Shiv Mohan Banka and Ching Yee, Principal Physiotherapists at Phoenix Rehab.Clinically reviewed by Louise Yow, Principal Physiotherapist & Director, AHPC A1300363H.Last reviewed 4 October 2026.
In most lower back pain, no scan will find the cause. That is the good news, not the bad news.
The large majority of back pain has no single structure you can point at on an image, and that group does better over time than the group with an obvious lesion. “Nothing showed up” is not the same as nothing is wrong, and it is a long way from nothing can be done.
$230 per 45 minute appointment. No referral needed to start.
Read this first
The symptoms that mean do not wait
Most back pain is mechanical and safe. A small proportion is not, and those are the ones worth knowing by heart.
- Emergency department now, today, if you have numbness around the groin, genitals or back passage, difficulty starting or controlling urination, loss of bowel control, or weakness in both legs.
- Emergency department now after significant trauma such as a fall from height or a road accident, or for a leg that has suddenly become markedly weak.
- A doctor the same day for back pain with fever, or severe pain that came on at rest with no injury.
- A doctor soon for back pain alongside unexplained weight loss, a history of cancer, night pain that is steadily worsening, or leg weakness getting worse week on week.
If that is you, act on it rather than booking us. We would rather send you to the right place than treat you.
Where are you right now?
It came on in the last few weeks
Lifting something, a sudden movement, or it was just there one morning. Most of these settle substantially inside six weeks. The useful work now is keeping you moving and not letting fear set the pace.
Six weeks to three months
Past the acute stage and not fully settled. This is the window where the difference gets made, and it is also the window people most often spend waiting to see what happens.
It keeps coming back
Two or three episodes a year, each one clearing, each one returning. That pattern is capacity, not damage, and it responds to a completely different plan than an acute episode does.
How it is usually classified
Acute, subacute, chronic, and why the label matters
The timeline shapes the plan more than the diagnosis does.
Acute, under six weeks
Usually a strain, a joint irritation or a disc. The aim is settling it, keeping you at work in some form, and avoiding the two things that prolong it: bed rest, and scans that find incidental changes and frighten people.
Subacute, six to twelve weeks
The stage that decides the next two years. If nothing has been rebuilt by now, the back goes back to normal life with less capacity than it had before, and the next episode is already in the post.
Chronic, beyond twelve weeks
Pain that has outlasted the tissue healing time. This is not a sign of ongoing damage and it is not in your head either. It responds to graded loading, to getting sleep and activity back, and to stopping the cycle of flaring and resting.
Non-specific, which is most of it
No single identifiable structure. Muscle, joint, disc and nerve all contribute and the examination points at patterns rather than a culprit. This is the largest group by far, and it has the most predictable response to structured work.
Send us your scan report or referral letter
We will tell you what it means for your rehabilitation, when therapy should start, and roughly how long it takes. No appointment needed to ask, and no charge for it.
We explain what the report means for your recovery and the likely timeframe. We do not diagnose from documents, which needs an assessment.
How the work is structured
Four stages, and you move up on criteria
You progress when you meet the marker for the next stage, not when a number of weeks has passed.
- Calm & Protect. Settling an irritable back and getting you sleeping and moving. Active from day one, because lying still is what turns a two week problem into a two month one.
- Move & Mobilize. Bending, turning and getting up and down without bracing against it. Hips and mid-back included, because they take the load the lower back is avoiding.
- Rebuild & Strengthen. Trunk, hips and legs, loaded progressively until you can lift what your life actually requires. This is the stage that stops the recurrence, and it is the stage that gets skipped.
- Return & Perform. The full working day, the deadlift, the garden, the child you pick up without thinking about it.
None of the four is passive.
Who you see
Physiotherapists and hand therapists, and nobody else
Back pain at Phoenix is managed by physiotherapists. Hand, wrist and elbow cases are managed by our hand therapy team, who are occupational therapists with additional training in that region. Every clinician holds a current registration with the Allied Health Professions Council, and each number is published on their own profile page.
You see the same person each visit for the length of a program, because the same clinician measuring the same thing the same way is how either of you can tell whether it is working.
If it has stopped moving forward
Years of treatment and the same back
A back that has been treated for years and is no better is usually one that has been managed rather than rebuilt. Something that felt good for two days, repeated indefinitely, is not a plan.
The Stalled Recovery Review is three appointments over three weeks with the same therapist, because whether anything is actually changing cannot be judged in a single visit. $690.
What it costs
$230 per 45 minute appointment
One therapist, the same one every visit, for the whole 45 minutes.
Nett, no GST. Same price for your first appointment and your last. Most of that 45 minutes is treatment: manual therapy, joint mobilization, soft tissue work, nerve mobilization and graded loading, with assessment continuing throughout. You do not pay for a consultation and come back another day to be treated.
A back program is 12 appointments, $2,760 in all, paid as you attend. If you need more, your physiotherapist shows you which stage criteria are still open, and each extra appointment is $230.
Questions we get asked
Do you treat chronic lower back pain that has lasted for years?
Yes. Back pain past three months is called chronic, and most of it has no single cause a scan can point to. At Phoenix Rehab, a physiotherapist works out what your back tolerates and what it does not, measures it, and builds the load back up in stages, one to one, for 45 minutes per appointment. If anything on the assessment needs a doctor, we tell you on the day.
Do I need an X-ray or MRI?
For most back pain, no, and imaging early can make things worse rather than better. Disc bulges and degenerative changes are present in large numbers of people who have never had back pain, so a scan frequently finds something that is not the cause and hands you a frightening word to carry around. Where the red flags above are present, or where imaging would change the plan, we say so and refer you to a doctor.
Is my posture the problem?
Less than you have been told. There is no single correct way to sit, and no posture has been shown to cause back pain on its own. What does matter is how long you hold any one position and how much capacity your back has for what you ask of it. The advice that helps is usually about variety and load rather than about sitting up straight.
Should I be lifting, or is that what caused it?
You should be lifting, once the acute stage has passed, and the way back is graded rather than avoided. Backs that are never loaded lose the capacity to handle ordinary life, which is what makes the next episode more likely. How much, how soon and in what form is exactly what the plan is for.
Will it come back?
Honestly, episodes of back pain recur for a lot of people, and anyone promising otherwise is selling something. What changes is how often, how severe, and how quickly you get on top of it, and those move considerably when the strength work actually gets done rather than abandoned at week five.
My scan showed degeneration. Is my spine wearing out?
Degenerative change on a spine scan is closer to grey hair than to disease. It is present in the majority of people past middle age, most of whom have no pain at all. It is a finding, not a verdict, and it does not decide what your back is capable of.
Where we are
Clinics across Singapore
ORCHARD
400 Orchard Road #12-12
Orchard Towers, S238875
NS22 Orchard MRT
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Orchard →
WhatsApp 8800 1830TAMPINES
9 Tampines Grande #01-20
Asia Green, S528735
EW2DT32 Tampines MRT
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Tampines →
WhatsApp 8780 9608SERANGOON
265 Serangoon Central Drive #04-269
S550265 · Lift C only
NE12CC13 Serangoon MRT
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Serangoon →
WhatsApp 8892 4121TANJONG PAGAR
10 Anson Road #02-77A
International Plaza, S079903
EW15 Tanjong Pagar MRT
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Tanjong Pagar →
WhatsApp 8227 7074JURONG EAST
2 Venture Drive #02-02
Vision Exchange, S608526
NS1EW24 Jurong East MRT
Opening 20 October 2026
Physiotherapy and hand therapy in Jurong East →
WhatsApp 8242 7340Find out which stage your back is in
Tell us how long it has been there, whether it goes down the leg, and what you have stopped doing because of it. Those three answers are worth more than a scan report.
Available at all clinics. $230 per 45 minute appointment, nett, no GST.
What our patients say
Google reviews from our clinics in Singapore.
