As a pain management doctor for the last 13 years, seeing thousands of patients with lower back pain, I noticed some curious patterns. On one hand, I saw lawyers and accountants, as well as others who did mostly sedentary work, with severe lower back pain and findings of severe degenerative disc disease on their MRIs, and on the other hand I noticed farmers and construction workers, those who did heavy physical work their whole lives, with minimal degenerative disc disease