Motor And Postural Control In Patients With Chronic Nonspecific Low Back Pain: A Blinded And Controlled Cross-Sectional Study Comparing The Quantity Of Motor And Postural Control Disturbances Between Healthy Controls And Patients With Chronic Non-Specific Low Back Pain

Background: Motor and postural control dysfunctions are hypothesized to be important for the development and clinical course of chronic, non-specific low back pain (cLBP). Objective: Evaluation of the ability of simple, reliable clinical tests to differentiate various aspects motor and postural control between patients with cLBP and healthy controls. Methods: Blinded, cross-sectional control study using clinical tests comparing motor and postural control between patients and healthy controls. Standardized and reliable clinical tests for motor and postural control were applied to patients with cLBPadmitted to different study centers. The quantity of positive findings wascompared to those in healthy controls measured by the same tests. Examiners were blinded regarding patient or control group. Results: We compared the motor and postural control of 46 cLBP patients and 36 healthy controls. Patients with cLBP had significantly more positive pathological tests for movement control (one-leg stance (p 0,006), hip extension, (p<0,001) and breathing pattern (p 0,032)). No significant differences were observed between groups for tests examining postural control. Patients with cLBP had significantly more trigger points in muscles relevant to postural control (pelvic floor; p 0,012). Conclusions: It was found that, in general, cLBP patients have poorer motor and postural control relative to healthy subjects. However, not all patients showed poor motor and postural control. Therefore, MPCD might only be relevant for a subgroup of patients with cLBP. Targeted diagnostic and treatment settings as well as preventive interventions for this subgroup should be the aim of further studies.