FSD3025 Back pain, Sickness Absences and Leg Length Discrepancy: Intervention 2008-2009

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Study title

Back pain, Sickness Absences and Leg Length Discrepancy: Intervention 2008-2009

Dataset ID Number

FSD3025

Persistent identifier

urn:nbn:fi:fsd:T-FSD3025

Data Type

Quantitative

Authors

  • Rannisto, Satu (Valmennustalo Sarastus)

Abstract

The survey charted leg length discrepancy as a risk factor for back pain in both sitting and standing work. It was assumed that lower limb discrepancy is an independent determinant of back pain, especially when standing at work. The aim of this study was also to give guidelines to occupational health services on how leg length discrepancy should be taken into account with people who suffer from back pain.

The connection between leg length discrepancy and back pain was investigated both by cross-sectional and by intervention design. The intervention part included persons standing at work who had, in the cross-sectional study, been diagnosed with a leg length discrepancy that could be a significant factor in terms of back pain.

The participants were placed into two groups at random: The intervention group was offered a shoe lift to be placed inside the shoe to gradually decrease the difference in leg length, whereas the control group only received supporting insoles. The prevalence of back pain in these two groups was observed for 12 months. During the year, the participants responded to this same survey four times: at the beginning of the study and after 3, 6 and 12 months. Following the intervention, information about sick leaves and visits to the doctor was collected for two years.

Leg length discrepancy was measured with a laser-based ultrasound method developed for the study, which is a non-invasive and fast method for reliably measuring lower limb discrepancy in standing position. Absences due to back pain were collected from the employer's register, and gender, age, BMI and the number of visits to the doctor were collected from the occupational health service provider's register. In the questionnaire, the respondents were asked about smoking and factors relating to the RAND-36 Measure of Health-Related Quality of Life, the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), and the Roland Morris Disability Questionnaire (RDQ). They were also asked to evaluate their lower back and sciatica pain on the visual analogue scale (VAS).

Outcome variables chosen for this study were the magnitude of lower back and sciatica pain (VAS), the length of sick leaves due to lower back pain (M50-54 in ICD-10), the number of visits to the doctor due to back pain, and a variety of factors relating to RAND-36, ODI and RDQ.

Keywords

back pain; health; mental health; pain; physical activities; physical fitness; physical mobility; quality of life; sick leave

Topic Classification

Series

Individual datasets

Distributor

Finnish Social Science Data Archive

Access

The dataset is (B) available for research, teaching and study.

Data Collector

  • Rannisto, Satu (Valmennustalo Sarastus)

Time Period Covered

2008 – 2009

Collection Dates

2008 – 2009

Nation

Finland

Geographical Coverage

Nurmo

Analysis/Observation Unit Type

Individual

Universe

Employees in the butcher shop of Atria's food factory (Atria Finland Ltd, Nurmo) over the age of 35 who had worked in the same tasks for 10 or more years and who had a leg length discrepancy of 5 mm or more.

Time Method

Longitudinal: Cohort/Event-based

Data Sources

Information about sick leaves was received from the employer's register; information about height, weight and visits to the doctor was received from the occupational health service provider's register.

Sampling Procedure

Total universe/Complete enumeration

The sample included all butchers who had responded to the starting questionnaire and were diagnosed with a leg length discrepancy of 5 mm or more in the cross-sectional study and who suffered from lower back pain (2 or over on the Visual Analogue Scale). Two persons, who did not respond to the surveys at 3, 6 and 12 months, dropped out of the study. The final sample consists of the intervention group (n=20) and the control group (n=20).

Collection Mode

Self-administered questionnaire: Paper

Self-administered questionnaire: Web-based (CAWI)

Field/Intervention experiment

Research Instrument

Structured questionnaire

Response Rate

93.3 within the group suitable for the intervention study.

Data File Language

Downloaded data package may contain different language versions of the same files.

The data files of this dataset are available in the following languages: Finnish.

FSD translates quantitative data into English on request, free of charge. More information on ordering data translation.

Data Version

2.0

Related Datasets

FSD3017 Back Pain, Sickness Absences and Leg Length Discrepancy 2008

Completeness of Data and Restrictions

The data have been anonymised during archiving. During anonymisation, variables BMI and age have been categorised.

In the data matrix, four rows were dedicated to each participant of the intervention study, totaling 160 rows. Each row contains a participant's responses from one collection round (0, 3, 6, and 12 months) to variables Q1 - Q73 and variables derived from them. Responses to variables Q74 - Q88, e.g. gender and leg length discrepancy, are only presented once on the "0 months" row.

Weighting

There are no weight variables in the data.

Citation Requirement

The data and its creators shall be cited in all publications and presentations for which the data have been used. The bibliographic citation may be in the form suggested by the archive or in the form required by the publication.

Bibliographical Citation

Rannisto, Satu (Valmennustalo Sarastus): Back pain, Sickness Absences and Leg Length Discrepancy: Intervention 2008-2009 [dataset]. Version 2.0 (2019-05-21). Finnish Social Science Data Archive [distributor]. https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:fsd:T-FSD3025

Deposit Requirement

Notify FSD of all publications where you have used the data by sending the citation information to user-services.fsd@tuni.fi.

Disclaimer

The original data creators and the archive bear no responsibility for any results or interpretations arising from the reuse of the data.

Related Materials

The development of the laser-based ultrasound method used for measuring leg length discrepancy is described in the article: Measurement of leg-length discrepancy using laser-based ultrasound method. Rannisto S, Paalanne N, Rannisto PH, Haapanen A, Oksaoja S, Uitti J, et al. Acta Radiologica, 2011; vol. 52, no 10, 1143?1146. doi: 10.1258/ar.2011.110268

Related Publications Tooltip

Rannisto, Satu & Okuloff, Annaleena & Uitti, Jukka & Paananen, Markus & Rannisto, Pasi-Heikki & Malmivaara, Antti & Karppinen, Jaro (2015). Leg-length discrepancy is associated with low back pain among those who must stand while working. BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, 16, 110-116. doi: 10.1186/s12891-015-0571-9

Rannisto, Satu & Okuloff, Annaleena & Uitti, Jukka & Paananen, Markus & Rannisto, Pasi-Heikki & Malmivaara, Antti & Karppinen, Jaro (2019). Correction of leg-length discrepancy among meat cutters with low back pain: a randomized controlled trial. BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, 20:105. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12891-019-2478-3

Study description in machine readable DDI-C 2.5 format

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Metadata record is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license.