Pain catastrophizing and trunk co-contraction during lifting in people with and without chronic low back pain: A cross sectional study.
Eur J Pain
; 2024 Aug 24.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-39180392
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
Trunk co-contraction during lifting may reflect a guarded motor response to a threatening task. This work estimated the impact of pain catastrophizing on trunk co-contraction during lifting, in people with and without low back pain.METHODS:
Adults with high pain catastrophizing (back pain n = 29, healthy n = 7) and low pain catastrophizing (back pain n = 20, healthy n = 11), performed 10 repetitions of a lifting task. Electromyography data of rectus abdominis, erector spinae and external oblique muscles were collected, bilaterally. Co-contraction indices were determined for rectus abdominis/erector spinae and external oblique/erector spinae pairings, bilaterally. Pain catastrophizing was measured using the pain catastrophizing scale and task-specific fear using the Photograph series of daily activities scale. Three-way mixed ANOVAs tested the effects of group (back pain vs. healthy), pain catastrophizing (high vs. low), lifting phase (lifting vs. replacing) and their interactions.RESULTS:
There were no main effects of pain catastrophizing, lifting phase, nor any interactions (p > 0.05). Group effects revealed greater co-contraction for bilateral erector spinae/rectus abdominis pairings (but not erector spinae-external oblique pairings) in people with back pain, compared to healthy participants, independent of pain catastrophizing and lifting phase (p < 0.05). Spearman correlations associated greater task-specific fear and greater erector spinae-left external oblique co-contraction, only in people with back pain (p < 0.05).CONCLUSIONS:
Greater co-contraction in the back pain group occurred independent of pain catastrophizing, as measured with a general questionnaire. A task-specific measure of threat may be more sensitive to detecting relationships between threat and co-contraction. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT This work contributes evidence that people with back pain commonly exhibit trunk co-contraction when lifting. The lack of a relationship between pain catastrophizing and trunk co-contraction, however, challenges evidence linking psychological factors and guarded motor behaviour in this group. Together, this suggests that other factors may be stronger determinants of co-contraction in people with LBP or that a general construct like pain catastrophizing may not accurately represent this relationship.
Texto completo:
1
Colección:
01-internacional
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Eur J Pain
Asunto de la revista:
NEUROLOGIA
/
PSICOFISIOLOGIA
Año:
2024
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
Canadá
Pais de publicación:
Reino Unido