Obviously, not all back pain needs treatment or referral to someone to see what is happening and in many cases, episodes of back pain are quite good at self-resolving with little to no intervention.  But what if we could identify what some of the common risk factors were for developing back pain from our everyday life and then use these to make small adjustments to what we do to potentially reduce the chances of us getting back pain?

Well a study by Micheletti, et al; 2019, showed that there are certain lifestyle factors that can have both positive AND negative effects on our back pain…..and some of these may surprise you!

The study looked at a total of 10,427 people who were asked a series of questions about their lifestyle and their experiences with pain.  I have tried to outline the findings below to make for easier reading.

Physical activity – IS associated with lower levels of back and neck pain

Smoking – NO association was found with smoking and back pain

Fruit and Veg intake – NO association was found with fruit and veg intake and back pain

So, these results make for very interesting reading.  There are multiple studies which look at physical activity and reduction in back pain levels and this is no surprise given that most Physio’s will prescribe exercises for the core and other areas to help with pain.  But smoking, that is a strange one!  It is proven that nicotine increases inflammation within the joints and back pain is often associated with inflammation – but this study showed that there is no direct correlation with smoking and levels of pain, which would indicate that maybe the back pain is not inflammatory and may instead be mechanical.  Either way, it may be reassuring for some as I have met people before who have almost ‘given up’ with trying to get better as they have been advised to stop smoking to get better and this task was too hard.

Finally, the point about fruit and veg intake is interesting too.  Those who have higher intakes or fruit and veg and often deemed ‘healthier’ but this is not always as simple as it seems!  Thankfully, this study helped show that it is not necessarily food intake that can lead to better outcomes.  I wish it were as it would certainly make this job much easier 😊!

To conclude, back pain is a common thing and if we go with the evidence, then exercise and being physically active are good ways of helping to reduce pain.  The key now though is getting the ‘right’ amount of activity so that you do not push the body too hard and increase risk of injury.  The ‘sweet spot’ is the key area.

If you are looking for help, guidance, and advice on how to overcome your back pain then why not get in touch with us here at Bodylogics and we can work with you on a tailor-made programme to help get you back on the path to recovery.  Call us now on 020 8368 9220.