Is low-back pain a limiting factor for senior workers with high physical work demands? A cross-sectional study
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(2020) 21:622
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Open Access
Is low-back pain a limiting factor for senior workers with high physical work demands? A cross-sectional study Patrick Pascal Nygaard1* , Sebastian Venge Skovlund1, Emil Sundstrup1 and Lars Louis Andersen1,2
Abstract Background: Low-back pain (LBP) is highly prevalent among senior workers and may affect work ability, especially among those with hard physical work. This study determined the joint association of LBP intensity and physical work demands with work limitiations due to pain in senior workers. Methods: In the SeniorWorkingLife study (2018), 11,738 senior workers (≥50 years) replied to questions about physical work demands, LBP intensity, and work limitations due to pain. Using logistic regression analyses and controlling for potential confounders, associations between the physical work demands and LBP intensity (interaction) with work limitiations due to pain (outcome) was modeled. Results: Higher LBP intensity, as well as higher physical work demands, significantly increased the odds of experiencing work limitiations due to pain, and these two factors interacted with each other (p < 0.0001). In analyses stratified for LBP intensity, higher physical work demands gradually increased the odds of experiencing work limitiations due to pain. Conclusions: Senior workers with a combination of physically demanding work and LBP are more affected by their pain during everyday work tasks compared to workers with similar LBP-intensity in sedentary occupations. Accommodation of work demands seems especially relevant for this group of workers. Keywords: Musculoskeletal disease, Occupational medicine, Ergonomics, Work ability, Physical work, Workplace, Sustainable employment, Low-back, Work limitations
Background Low-back pain (LBP) is the greatest cause of disability globally [1–3]. It is estimated that 50–80% of all adults will experience LBP at some point in their life [4, 5], and especially the elderly are at risk of experiencing LBP as the incidence and prevalence increase with age [6, 7]. According to the 2018 Danish Work Environment Cohort Study (DWECS), 32.5% of the Danish workforce between 18 and 65 years of age have been experiencing * Correspondence: [email protected] 1 Musculoskeletal Disorders and Physical Workload, National Research Centre for the Working Environment, Lersø Parkallé 105, 2100 Copenhagen, Denmark Full list of author information is available at the end of the article
musculoskeletal pain several times a week during the past 3 months while 5.1% are limited in their job due to pain [7]. In addition to aging, both individual and environmental risk factors for LBP have been identified [8, 9]. Individual factors may include metabolism, biochemistry, physical/anthropometrical factors (e.g. a long back), and depressive symptoms among other things [8]. As for the work environment, both psychosocial factors (e.g. low job satisfaction and collegial support) and physical demands (e.g. manual labour including frequent lifting/ handling heavy loa
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