When I saw the Back Surgeon I told him I was riding the NuStep for 30 minutes and he said that was fine, but it meant I was doing the easy way out: sitting down. He said the answer was walk, walk, walk, so I decided to try the Tread Mill. I am now up to 15 minutes 3 X's a week on it. Obviously, I am not running top speed, I only set speed at 1.5 and the same for the incline, but I do feel better doing it. (I still do 15 min on the NuStep.) I am not up on the technical (i.e., which joints in my back are affected) but I know they are near the bottom, if not the bottom ones. There is a test for this: EMG, It is generally administered by someone in Neurology, It is great fun. They stick needles in spots and then apply a small jolt of electricity and see what wiggles - or probably what lights up on a computer screen. (I wasn't watching - they were working from my toes to my hip.) Whatever, the results were very clear as were the results of the MRI. On the MRI, you can see the area where the spinal cord goes through the column gets VERY small. There are some injections they tried. One - no way. The other one - it seems to be keeping some of the pain away.Maybe this will add more tools to your tool kit.