Sudden Attacks of Back Pain More Likely in Morning

A/Prof Manuela Ferreira PhD Senior Research Fellow, Musculoskeletal Division Associate Professor, Sydney Medical School The George Institute for Global Health Sydney Australia MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
A/Prof Manuela Ferreira
PhD
Senior Research Fellow, Musculoskeletal Division
Associate Professor, Sydney Medical School
The George Institute for Global Health
Sydney Australia

MedicalResearch: What is the background for this study?

Dr. Ferreira: Our study was set up to look at the common triggers for sudden and moderate to severe episodes of back pain.

It included 1,000 participants with this condition. Participants were interviewed in the first week their pain episode occurred in and were asked to describe their physical and psychosocial activities in the 3 days preceding pain onset.

MedicalResearch: What are the main findings?

Dr. Ferreira: The results of the study have shown that sudden attacks of back pain are more likely to be triggered in the morning, between 8 am and 11 am.

Being distracted while engaged in manual tasks, manual tasks performed in an awkward posture, or those involving objects not close to the body and lifting heavy loads were activities that most likely would trigger a new episode of back pain, even following very brief exposure (i.e. less than 2 hours). If you feel like this is you, you should visit a round rock chiropracter to aid progress!

MedicalResearch: What should clinicians and patients take away from your report?

Dr. Ferreira: The key message for clinicians and patients is that we should be careful when lifting: even brief exposure to heavy loads and awkward postures will drastically increase our chances of developing back pain. In addition, being distracted and fatigued during manual tasks will likely increase our risk of having back pain.

MedicalResearch: What recommendations do you have for future research as a result of this study?

Response: Low back pain affects approximately one quarter of the world population and is among the main causes of disability globally. We need to focus on prevention of back pain and the findings of this study are important as all the activities shown to increase our risk of back pain can be modifiable.

Citation:

What triggers an episode of acute low back pain? A case-crossover study

Daniel Steffens Manuela L Ferreira PhD Jane Latimer PhD Paulo H Ferreira PhD Bart W Koes PhD Fiona Blyth PhD Qiang Li PhD1 and Christopher G Maher PhD

Arthritis Care and Research: DOI: 10.1002/acr.22533

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MedicalResearch.com Interview with:, & A/Prof Manuela Ferreira (2015). Sudden Attacks of Back Pain More Likely in Morning MedicalResearch.com

Last Updated on February 10, 2015 by Marie Benz MD FAAD