Different Level, but a Similar Day Pattern of Physical Activity in Workers and Sick-Listed People With Chronic Nonspecific Musculoskeletal Pain

Reneman MF, de Vries RI, van den Hengel EJ, Brouwer S. van der Woude LH. Different level, but a similar day pattern of physical activity in workers and sick-listed people with chronic nonspecific musculoskeletal pain. Arch Phys Med Rehabil 2012;93:1864-7.

Objective: To investigate whether physical activity (PA) levels and day patterns of sick-listed workers with chronic nonspecific musculoskeletal pain (CMP) admitted for multidisciplinary rehabilitation are different from those of workers with CMP.

Design: Cross-sectional.

Setting: Outpatient rehabilitation center and general community.

Participants: A convenience sample of sick-listed patients with CMP (n = 27) referred for multidisciplinary pain rehabilitation, and a volunteer sample of workers with CMP (n = 107;

Intervention: Participants wore an accelerometer for 5 to 7 consecutive days.

Main Outcome Measure: PA, expressed as activity counts. All analyses were corrected for confounders.

Results: PA levels of workers with CMP were higher than those of sick-listed patients (P = .01). After correction for confounders, work status explained 3.5% of the variance observed in activity counts (F-change = 5.27, P=.024). In the mornings, group status significantly contributed to the variance in mean activity counts (F-change = 5.32, P = .02). In afternoons (F-change =3.29, P = .07) and evenings (F-change = 2.41, P = .12), the effect of group status on PA level was nonsignificant. No Significant interaction was observed between time and group status (Wilks' lambda = .92, F-14,F-104 = .66, P = .80).

Conclusions: Workers with CMP have a higher PA level compared with sick-listed patients. The PA day pattern did not differ significantly between the 2 groups.