The German population-based multi-centre case-control study EPILIFT investigated the dose-response relationship between occupational exposure to manual materials handling and/or working postures with trunk inclination and lumbar spine disease. In this study, also occupational exposure to whole body vibration (WBV) was assessed. 564 subjects with lumbar disc herniation, 351 subjects with a lumbar chondrosis and 901 control subjects were recruited. Of these, 65 disc herniation patients, 39 chondrosis patients and 73 control subjects had been exposed to whole body vibrations. However, only few women were exposed; therefore, a statistical analysis of female subjects was not recommended, and the analysis was restricted to males. A shift-based WBV threshold for the assessment acceleration of a_w(8)=0.63 m/s ² and a lowered threshold of a_w(8)=0.45 m/s² was applied. Accelerations in the x, y and z-direction (VDI 205 7, 2002 Bl.1) were gathered; however, in this analysis, only WBV exposures in the z-direction are taken into account. No association between cumulative exposure to whole body vibration and lumbar disc herniation was found in men. However, there was a monotonously increasing although non-significant relationship between the cumulative dose of whole body vibration and the risk of chondrosis in men. This association was found in the analyses both with a threshold of a _w(8)=0,63 m/s² (Odds Ratio OR 1.7, confidence interval CI _93% 0,8-3,5) and of a_w(8)=0,45 m/s² (OR 1.9, CI _95% 0,8-4,3). If, according to the hitherto existing guidance dose value by Dupuis, only subjects with a cumulative dose of D_VRI >1.450 (m/s²)² are assigned to the highest category, a statistically significant OR of 2,4 (CI _95%, 1.1-5.3) is found for the threshold of a_w(8)=0.45 m/s². The different findings for the two case groups support the supposition that disc herniation and chondrosis have to be considered as distinct disease patterns concerning exposure to whole body vibration.