A correlation between low back pain and associated factors: a study involving 772 patients who had undergone general physical examination.
Many factors are associated with the development of low back pain. Among them, exercise, obesity, smoking, age, educational level and stress are the most common. This study examined the association of these factors with low back pain. An additional aim was to determine a procedure for preventing low back pain. This study analyzed the responses to a questionnaire sent to 772 individuals who had undergone a medical examination at this hospital in 2003 and excluded the individuals who had shown symptoms or their test results indicated a particular disease. Assuming that there were no variables, individuals who exercised regularly 3-4 times per week would have a lower chance of having low back pain than those who did not exercise regularly. The analysis revealed that individuals with a college degree or higher education have a lower chance of experiencing low back pain than those with only a high school education or even college drop-outs. When the other variables were constant, age, extent of obesity (body mass index), smoking and level of stress were not found to affect the development of low back pain. The level of education was associated with the development of low back pain. However, regular exercise 3-4 times per week or more would be most effective in reducing the incidence and duration of low back pain.
Kwon
Min A
MA
Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, Samsung Medical Center, 50 Ilwon-Dong, Gangnam-Gu, Seoul, Korea.
Shim
Woo Seok
WS
Kim
Myung Hee
MH
Gwak
Mi Sook
MS
Hahm
Tae Soo
TS
Kim
Gaab Soo
GS
Kim
Chung Su
CS
Choi
Yoon Ho
YH
Park
Jeong Heon
JH
Cho
Hyun Sung
HS
Kim
Tae Hyeong
TH
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D017677:Age Distribution; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D015897:Comorbidity; D004522:Educational Status; D015444:Exercise; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007723:Korea / Q000453:epidemiology; D017116:Low Back Pain / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000517:prevention & control; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009765:Obesity / Q000453:epidemiology; D010808:Physical Examination / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011379:Prognosis; D018570:Risk Assessment / Q000379:methods*; D012307:Risk Factors; D017678:Sex Distribution; D012907:Smoking / Q000453:epidemiology; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000453:epidemiology