- With Mayo Clinic rheumatologist
April Chang-Miller, M.D.
read biographyclose windowBiography of
April Chang-Miller, M.D.
April Chang-Miller, M.D.
Dr. April Chang-Miller is board certified in internal medicine and rheumatology and is a consultant in the Division of Rheumatology and Internal Medicine at Mayo Clinic in Arizona.
Dr. Chang-Miller's primary field is rheumatology with special interests in inflammatory joint diseases called seronegative spondyloarthropathies such as ankylosing spondylitis and psoriatic arthritis. She also cares for patients with rheumatoid arthritis and polymyalgia rheumatica.
The New York City native is a graduate of the Yale University School of Medicine and had been with Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., between 1991 and 2002 when she relocated to Mayo Clinic, Arizona. She is a fellow in the American College of Rheumatology and has been on the board of directors of the Arthritis Foundation North Central Chapter.
Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Question
Discogram: What is it?
What is a discogram?
Answer
from April Chang-Miller, M.D.
A discogram, or diskogram, is a test used prior to spinal fusion surgery to help determine which disk or disks are a source of pain. The test itself is simply an enhanced X-ray examination (CT scan) of the pads of cartilage (intervertebral disks) that separate the bones in your spine (vertebrae). During this procedure, dye is injected under low pressure into the center of at least three different disks. Then the CT scan is performed to observe the amount of structural changes in each disk.
A discogram is used primarily to help determine whether a disk is causing pain. By injecting dye into the disk while monitoring for reproduction of back pain, the doctor can determine if the disk is a source of chronic low back pain and therefore needs to be removed as part of a spinal fusion surgery. The test can detect structural damage in a disk and show if a disk has begun to rupture or has tears in its outer ring.
