Investigating the Relationship of Functional Tests With Pain Intensity in Active Women and Men With Non-specific Chronic Low Back Pain

Low back pain is humans’ most common musculoskeletal complication. The prevalence of this disorder is reported at 80% during the lifetime. This study aims to investigate the relationship between functional tests and low back pain in active women and men.

This was a cross-sectional correlational research. A total of 80 active men and women with non-specific chronic low back pain in the age range of 20 to 35 years were selected based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The level of pain was measured using the visual analogue scale test and after a 10-min warm-up, the performance was measured using the functional movement screen, +9, and Y balance functional tests. We used the SPSS software, version 21 to analyze the data at a significance level of 0.95.

The results of the Spearman correlation coefficient test showed a significantly negative relationship between low back pain and functional tests of functional movement screen and +9 (r=-0.66, P=0.001; r=-0.71, P=0.001, respectively). In addition, a significantly negative correlation was observed between the Y balance test and the amount of low back pain in active women and men (r=0.71, P=0.001).

By increasing the participants’ performance, their low back pain is likely to decrease, and specialists, coaches, and occupational therapists can probably reduce the low back pain in individuals with non-specific chronic low back pain by improving motor function.