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A study was conducted on the incidence and prevalence of back pain among nursing personnel and nonnursing members of the general population. Lower back pain was reported by 78.2% of the nurses, compared to 67.6% of the nonnursing personnel. Age was significantly correlated with the point prevalence of back pain among nurses; significant correlations between age and both point and annual prevalence of back pain were seen for the general population. Nurses considered patient handling tasks, particularly the task of repositioning a patient in bed, to be significant in the onset of back pain symptoms. The magnitude of the back pain problem among the nurses increased since the results of a similar study were reported in 1983. While the prevalence of back pain among the nurses and members of the general population may have been similar, there was a greater number of new cases observed among the nursing personnel. Revisions have since been made in the manual handling of loads by nurses and in their training.
Occupational Medicine, 45(5):263-267, 1995. (8 references)
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