Chronic low back pain: a successful intervention for desk-bound workers

Barone Gibbs et al1 present a small experimental study demonstrating the positive effects of an intervention with the goal of decreasing sedentary behaviour for desk-bound workers with chronic low back pain. The intervention had multiple components that included a combination of individual cognitive and behaviour-based counselling and a change in the work environment (workstation), all of which were supported by each participant’s supervisor. The wider implications is that this study provides supporting evidence that interventions targeting worker behaviour addressing chronic health issues that change the conditions of work have greater effect than single-component interventions.

Integrated approaches to improve worker health address multiple conditions of work, including work organisation, physical environment, psychosocial factors, and job tasks and demand factors.2 These integrated and comprehensive approaches have better success and larger effects than single narrowly focused programmes.3 For low back pain, Barone Gibbs et al cite reviews saying that the...

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