Are you aware of any organizations trying to combat lower back pain by encouraging exercise in the developing world? This post seems like half personal advice, half the implication that this might be a solid cause area for global health, and I’m wondering whether anyone is doing anything in the latter space.
Regarding Magnus’ post, which you linked, I partly wrote this article as a response. The evidence base for preventing low back pain with exercise seems much greater than that for adjusting posture, stretching and using ergonomic furniture, which his post also recommends. I wanted to emphasise the importance of exercise as the primary intervention.
The evidence base for preventing low back pain with exercise seems much greater than that for adjusting posture, stretching and using ergonomic furniture, which his post also recommends. I wanted to emphasise the importance of exercise as the primary intervention.
It’s not clear to me that Huang et al. compared exercise to the best alternative interventions, so it seems safer to say that it’s best among those included in that review, and perhaps among the interventions that have been studied the most. But that’s a considerably weaker claim than “low back pain is best prevented by exercise”.
[ETA: Also, are you sure that stretching wasn’t in many cases part of the exercise studies included in the review? It’s not clear to me from reading the paper, and if it was included, the review might actually support stretching, too, as opposed to supporting exercise over stretching. In any case, it’s not clear to me that the claim about exercise being more important than stretching is in fact supported by the review in question.]
FWIW, the data I’ve seen on the effects of getting a better bed, both in terms of small-scale studies and anecdotal evidence, suggests that it could well be more significant, and at least that it’s more significant for a considerable number of people (probably especially among those who are already quite physically active). (Note also that it might be expensive and difficult to find appropriate beds for a large number of people in a study, which could be a hurdle to proper studies of this intervention.) I also wouldn’t be surprised if curcumin supplementation did significantly better than the best exercise interventions if compared head-to-head (it’s probably the single most effective thing I’ve tried, and I’d strongly encourage people with LBP to try it).
Regarding global health, the Happier Lives Institute produced a report on pain in 2020 that identified low back pain as a focus area, but missed my references [3-5]. In particular, my reference [4] seems to supersede their reference (Steffens et al., 2017) and my reference [3] seems broader and more recent than their reference (NICE, 2016). I think their recommendations might reasonably update with respect to these references.
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/3MiMJYwYrhPmNcNBM/problem-area-report-pain-1
World Spine Care is a non-profit focused on decreasing the burden of disability caused by low back pain. While the primary projects are direct care through clinics and research, they did trial a Yoga Project which trained patients and other local people in Botswana to teach yoga classes with movements modified for people experiencing chronic pain. They were also teaching a simple movement practice called Straighten-Up to patient groups and school-aged children.
I’ve wondered whether there would be any benefit to a media campaign similar to Development Media International.
Are you aware of any organizations trying to combat lower back pain by encouraging exercise in the developing world? This post seems like half personal advice, half the implication that this might be a solid cause area for global health, and I’m wondering whether anyone is doing anything in the latter space.
Also, anyone who found this post interesting might also want to read this post on lower back pain.
Regarding Magnus’ post, which you linked, I partly wrote this article as a response. The evidence base for preventing low back pain with exercise seems much greater than that for adjusting posture, stretching and using ergonomic furniture, which his post also recommends. I wanted to emphasise the importance of exercise as the primary intervention.
It’s not clear to me that Huang et al. compared exercise to the best alternative interventions, so it seems safer to say that it’s best among those included in that review, and perhaps among the interventions that have been studied the most. But that’s a considerably weaker claim than “low back pain is best prevented by exercise”.
[ETA: Also, are you sure that stretching wasn’t in many cases part of the exercise studies included in the review? It’s not clear to me from reading the paper, and if it was included, the review might actually support stretching, too, as opposed to supporting exercise over stretching. In any case, it’s not clear to me that the claim about exercise being more important than stretching is in fact supported by the review in question.]
FWIW, the data I’ve seen on the effects of getting a better bed, both in terms of small-scale studies and anecdotal evidence, suggests that it could well be more significant, and at least that it’s more significant for a considerable number of people (probably especially among those who are already quite physically active). (Note also that it might be expensive and difficult to find appropriate beds for a large number of people in a study, which could be a hurdle to proper studies of this intervention.) I also wouldn’t be surprised if curcumin supplementation did significantly better than the best exercise interventions if compared head-to-head (it’s probably the single most effective thing I’ve tried, and I’d strongly encourage people with LBP to try it).
Regarding global health, the Happier Lives Institute produced a report on pain in 2020 that identified low back pain as a focus area, but missed my references [3-5]. In particular, my reference [4] seems to supersede their reference (Steffens et al., 2017) and my reference [3] seems broader and more recent than their reference (NICE, 2016). I think their recommendations might reasonably update with respect to these references. https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/3MiMJYwYrhPmNcNBM/problem-area-report-pain-1
Hi Aaron,
World Spine Care is a non-profit focused on decreasing the burden of disability caused by low back pain. While the primary projects are direct care through clinics and research, they did trial a Yoga Project which trained patients and other local people in Botswana to teach yoga classes with movements modified for people experiencing chronic pain. They were also teaching a simple movement practice called Straighten-Up to patient groups and school-aged children.
I’ve wondered whether there would be any benefit to a media campaign similar to Development Media International.