Acute Low Back Pain??Don?t Forget Multifidus!

Acute Low Back Pain??Don?t Forget Multifidus!

Reference:Hides J, Richardson C, Jull G 1996 Multifidus muscle recovery is not automatic following resolution of acute first episode low back pain. Spine 21:2763-2769

39 patients with acute, first-episode, unilateral low back pain participated in this Australian study.

They all had significant decreases in their low lumbar multifidus cross-sectional area (Diagnostic Ultrasound was used).

They were randomly allocated to either a control group or to a multifidus-retraining group.

The Physiotherapy treatments were provided 2X / week for four weeks.

Guess what? After the 4-week and 10-week follow-up examinations both groups of patients were symptom free and they all had returned to their normal functional activities.

However, the multifidus retraining group had significant improvements in their multifidus cross-sectional area compared to the control group (P=0.0001).

Study Conclusion: Multifidus recovery is not automatic after resolution of acute low back pain

Clinical Relevance: Multifidus inhibition after an acute episode low back pain may be a reason for the high recurrence rate!

Posted on: October 30, 2002

Categories: Lumbar Spine