Comparison of the Spinal Posture in sagittal plane of Female and Male Methadone-Maintained Opioid Dependents with Healthy Subjects

In addition to psychological effects, addiction to opioids can cause negative effects on physical aspects, central nervous and musculoskeletal system and the body posture as well. Poor posture causes pressure on the different structures of the body and makes the internal and vital organs vulnerable. 30 male and 30 female methadone maintained drug dependants participated in the research voluntarily. Subjects were selected purposefully. 30 healthy women and 30 healthy men were homogenous in term of age, height, weight and BMI with the addictive samples selected as control groups.
Subjects’ thoracic kyphosis and lumbar lordosis were measured by flexible ruler by Hopenfeld method. The cervical spinal curvature was measured by using the Photogrammetry method. Based on the findings of this study and the results of MANOVA, there was a significant difference among cervical spine posture (p=0.0001), thoracic kyphosis (p=0.0001) and lumbar lordosis (p=0.005) of addicted males and females and healthy males and females. Based on the findings, there was a large effect size and a significant difference among the spinal curvature of the addicted males and females and the healthy ones. Finally, it was concluded that drug dependence affected negatively on the spine of men and women.