Abstract: Occupational back pain proves a more serious, disabling, and costly variety of back pain - with the majority of costs related to indirect expenses such as time off work. Prognostic indicators for return to work change as the weeks off work progress. The general theme to emerge from studying this change is that early, active, professionally-monitored treatment proves most likely to encourage fast return to work.
Among office workers who use computers extensively, the one-year prevalence of significant neck pain has been reported at 46%. The lifetime prevalence may be as high as 70%.1 The ability to offer evidence-based advice and to identify which workers need more than advice can help clinicians be of greater use to this group of patients.
In the broadest terms, one of the main reasons patients present themselves to healthcare practitioners is pain. Pharmacological treatments rank as the most common approach to pain,1 but recent decades have seen an increasing interest in non-pharmacological approaches.
Abstract: The problem of low back pain is growing, costly, and disabling, and it seems that the majority of patients entering the healthcare system for low back pain develop persistent, chronic symptoms. A recent study out of La Trobe University is the first randomised controlled trial to compare guideline-based advice to individualised physiotherapy. Patients receiving physiotherapy prove 1.5 times more likely to enjoy clinically significant improvement in disability at 52 weeks.
Abstract: The most current systematic review of exercise therapy for chronic fatigue syndrome concludes that exercise therapy is safe and results in reduced fatigue, better sleep, improved physical function, and greater self-reported general health.
Abstract: Fibromyalgia is now known to be a neurosensory disorder of central sensitization with hereditary components related to chronically low serotonin levels. Exercise therapy has long been established as a treatment to mitigate the symptoms of fibromyalgia. Recent research demonstrates exercise therapy’s normalisation effect on the connectivity of brain areas related to the subjective processing of pain.
Abstract: A prospective, randomised, controlled trial published in the Archives of Physical Medicine earlier this year finds that patients with whiplash associated disorder lasting six months to three years achieve better outcomes in a physiotherapy program than in a wait-list control. Patients with longstanding pain and/or disability trended toward 41% mean improvement in pain after the physiotherapy program.
Abstract: A recent meta-analysis finds that anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries are associated with measured proprioceptive deficits. This adds to the evidence of older demonstrations showing how proprioceptive training can decrease the incidence of ACL injuries by 85% to 88%. For lower extremity joint injuries, the ideal rehabilitation program will include specific proprioception assessment and training.
Abstract: In the first-ever study comparing physiotherapy to corticosteroid injections for shoulder impingement syndrome, the outcomes for pain and disability were the same. Physiotherapy patients proved 38% less likely to seek non-study attention for their shoulders. Physiotherapy may do more to address the underlying pathology while also giving patients greater ability and confidence in future self-management.
