Low Back Pain and Disability: A Descriptive Study from Iran

Back pain is a common disabling chronic problem that burdens individuals, families and societies. Chronic Low Back Pain (CLBP) has a significant effect on functional status and limiting work activity. This study aimed to assess the status of CLBP and disability among individuals who referred to Zanjan University of Medical Sciences (ZUMS).

 This descriptive study was performed on individuals with CLBP who referred to the teaching hospitals of ZUMS. In this study, the demographic questionnaire and the Oswestry Lumbar Disability Questionnaire were used to collect information to assess disability and change in life activities. The questionnaire of Van Korf et al. was used to measure pain intensity with Numerical Pain Rate (NPR). Finally, the data were entered into SPSS software version 26 and statistical analysis was performed in frequency / percentage.

Totally 238 individuals including 159 (66.8) women with a mean age of (40.06±13.22) and 79 (33.2) men with a mean age of (35.56±16.12) participated in the study completed the questionnaires. According to the results, 56.3% (N=) of participants have disabilities and 34.5% (N=) have low disabilities.