Do psychological factors increase the risk for back pain in the general population in both a cross-sectional and prospective analysis?

This study aimed to conduct a comprehensive evaluation of background, individual and workplace psychological risk factors to investigated their relationship with spinal pain. Because there is some doubt as to whether the results of cross-sectional findings hold in longitudinal studies, a prospective study was superimposed upon a cross-sectional design of the effects of psychological variables on back pain and function to determine, whether similar results are obtained. Participants were workers randomly selected from the general population, where 372 had not experienced pain during the past year, and 209 had experienced considerable pain problems. A cross-sectional comparison of these groups using multivariate statistics indicated that the most potent risk factors were psychological distress (odds ratio=13.2) and poor function (odds ratio=6.4). Much smaller levels of risk were found for perceived workload, gender and foreign birth. Those participants with no pain were followed for one year to determine development of a spinal pain problem. Although few participants developed a significant pain problem, the prospective analyses showed that psychological distress (odds ratio=2.2), catastrophizing (odds ratio=3.0), and workload (odds ratio=2.3) produced the highest odds ratios. Taken together these results underscore the need for a multidimensional view of the development of pain disability. Moreover, individual psychological factors such as distress and catastrophizing as well as work place factors like work load were found to be highly related to the development of back pain in a sample of workers from the general population. The cross-sectional and prospective results were similar in character and demonstrate that cross-sectional studies may provide valuable information. Because psychological variables were relevant very early on, these factors may be important targets for pain prevention programs.