Table 1.

Categories of variables in the Bayesian network.

Category namea	Definition
Risk factor	These are pre-existing factors that might raise (or lower) the chances of the patient having a certain judgement factor or characterization of low back pain. They may also have an effect on the efficacy of the treatment but, crucially, are factors (like age and demographics) that cannot be changed by the treatment.
Signs and symptoms	These are factors that arise as a consequence of the patient having certain conditions or judgement factors. In contrast to risk factors, signs and symptoms are factors that may change or respond to treatment.
Judgement factors	These are clinical reasoning factors or the characterization of the patient’s low back pain. They are the factors that are likely to be unmeasurable with a Patient Reported Outcome Measure or test, but which help a clinician reason about prognosis or likelihood of recovery.

^aExplanatory information about each type of variable will be made available to participants in order to inform the categorization of factors from the prepopulated lists and those created in the elicitation.