Psychological predictors of change in the number of musculoskeletal pain sites among Norwegian employees: a prospective study
One article on PainSci cites Christensen 2017: Your Back Is Not Out of Alignment
PainSci notes on Christensen 2017:
More aches and pains are predicted by “several psychological & physiological factors,” namely “emotional exhaustion, mental distress, sleep disturbance, tiredness and headache intensity.” Increases in those factors were associated with more pain sites, and decreases with fewer pain sites.
original abstract †Abstracts here may not perfectly match originals, for a variety of technical and practical reasons. Some abstacts are truncated for my purposes here, if they are particularly long-winded and unhelpful. I occasionally add clarifying notes. And I make some minor corrections.
BACKGROUND: The pathogenesis of syndromes of widespread musculoskeletal pain remains an enigma. The present study sought to determine if psychological states, job satisfaction, pain intensity, and sleep problems contributed to the spread and decline of the number of musculoskeletal pains.
METHODS: A sample of 2989 Norwegian employees completed a questionnaire at baseline and follow-up 2 years later. Data were analyzed with multinomial and ordinal logistic regression analyses to determine effects on direction and degree of change of number of pain sites (NPS).
RESULTS: After adjustment for sex, age, skill level, and number of pain sites at baseline, increases in the number of pain sites from baseline to follow-up were predicted by emotional exhaustion, mental distress, having little surplus, feeling down and sad, sleep disturbances, and intensity of headache. Decreases were predicted by low levels of emotional exhaustion, mental distress, sleep disturbances, restlessness, and lower intensity of headache, neck pain, shoulder pain, and back pain. Higher numbers of pain sites at baseline were associated with reduction of number of pain sites and lower likelihood of spread. Some factors that did not predict whether decrease or increase occurred were nevertheless associated with the degree of decrease (depression, anxiety, having surplus, self-efficacy) or increase (anxiety).
CONCLUSIONS: Several psychological and physiological factors predicted change in the number of pain sites. There is a need for further investigations to identify possible mechanisms by which psychological and behavioral factors propagate the spread of pain.
This page is part of the PainScience BIBLIOGRAPHY, which contains plain language summaries of thousands of scientific papers & others sources. It’s like a highly specialized blog. A few highlights:
- Photobiomodulation therapy is not better than placebo in patients with chronic nonspecific low back pain: a randomised placebo-controlled trial. Guimarães 2021 Pain.
- No effect of creatine monohydrate supplementation on inflammatory and cartilage degradation biomarkers in individuals with knee osteoarthritis. Cornish 2018 Nutr Res.
- The CANBACK trial: a randomised, controlled clinical trial of oral cannabidiol for people presenting to the emergency department with acute low back pain. Bebee 2021 Med J Aust.
- Relationships Between Sleep Quality and Pain-Related Factors for People with Chronic Low Back Pain: Tests of Reciprocal and Time of Day Effects. Gerhart 2017 Ann Behav Med.
- Modulation in the elastic properties of gastrocnemius muscle heads in individuals with plantar fasciitis and its relationship with pain. Zhou 2020 Sci Rep.