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Basics

• Summary
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• Diagnosis and Tests

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• Specifics

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Research

• Clinical Trials
• Journal Articles

Resources

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For You

• Children
• Patient Handouts

Summary

The tailbone is the small bone at the bottom of your backbone, or spine. Tailbone disorders include tailbone injuries, pain, infections, cysts and tumors. You rarely break your tailbone. Instead, most injuries cause bruises or pulled ligaments. A backward fall onto a hard surface, such as slipping on ice, is the most common cause of such injuries. Symptoms of various tailbone disorders include pain in the tailbone area, pain upon sitting, pain or numbness in the arms or legs due to pressure on nerves in the tailbone area, and a mass or growth you can see or feel.

Start Here

• Tailbone Pain: How Can I Relieve It? (Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research) Also in Spanish

Diagnosis and Tests

• Bone X-Ray (American College of Radiology; Radiological Society of North America) Also in Spanish
• Spine CT (American College of Radiology; Radiological Society of North America) Also in Spanish
• Spine MRI (American College of Radiology; Radiological Society of North America) Also in Spanish

Specifics

• Levator Syndrome (Merck & Co., Inc.) Also in Spanish
• Pilonidal Cyst (Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research) Also in Spanish
• Pilonidal Disease (American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons)
• Sacral Dimple (Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research) Also in Spanish
• Tarlov Cysts (National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke)

Clinical Trials

• ClinicalTrials.gov: Pilonidal Sinus (National Institutes of Health)

Journal Articles References and abstracts from MEDLINE/PubMed (National Library of Medicine)

• Article: Coccydynia in a Patient With Ankylosing Spondylitis: Enthesitis or Structural Disorder?
• Article: A Rare Presentation of Axial Chordoma and the Approach to Management.
• Article: Japanese clinical practice guidelines for sacrococcygeal teratoma, 2017.
• Tailbone Disorders -- see more articles

Find an Expert

• American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons
• National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases Also in Spanish

Children

• Pilonidal Cyst (For Parents) (Nemours Foundation)
• What's the Gips Procedure? Treating Pilonidal Cysts (For Parents) (Nemours Foundation) Also in Spanish

Patient Handouts

• Pilonidal sinus disease (Medical Encyclopedia) Also in Spanish
• Surgery for pilonidal cyst (Medical Encyclopedia) Also in Spanish
• Tailbone trauma (Medical Encyclopedia) Also in Spanish
• Tailbone trauma - aftercare (Medical Encyclopedia) Also in Spanish