Shazia Jatoi, Muhammad Tanveer Alam, Qamar-un-nisa, Arvind, Naila, Sarwat Nasir.
To Determine the Frequency of Chronic Backache in the Nursing Staff of A Tertiary Care Hospital.
Med Forum Jan ;2(11):16-9.

Objective: To Determine the frequency of chronic backache in the nursing staff of a tertiary care hospital. Study Design: Cross sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: This study was carried out at Civil Hospital Karachi from 1st November 2011 to 30th April 2012. Materials and Methods: Two hundred seventy two patients were included who fulfilled the inclusion criteria after taking the informed consent. The SPSS version 14 was applied to the data. Data was analyzed through SPSS software. Results: 49 (18%) males and 223 (82%) females. The mean age of study population was 43 ± 7.5 years and mean duration of job was 19.3 ± 7.6 years. 10 (3.7%) subjects had history of daily duration of work of less than 6 hours and only 06 (2.2%) work for more than 12 hours daily as compared to this 256 (94.1%) study subjects work for 6-12 hours daily. 05 (1.8%) had history of posture of sitting at most of their working hours, followed by 10 (3.7%) standing, 85 (31.3%) mobile and 172 (63.2%) subjects had non-specific posture. 197 (72.4%) had backache as compared to this 75 (27.6%) did not had backache. Out of 197, 05 (1.8%) had backache at thoracic area, another 05 (1.8%) had backache at cervical & lumbar areas followed by 20 (7.4%) had backache at cervical area and 167 (61.4%) had backache at lumbar area. 77 (28.3%) had the history of radiation of backache. 7 (2.6%) had backache for <6 weeks, 32 (11.8%) had backache for 6 weeks to 3 months and 158 (58.1%) had back ache for >3 months. Conclusion: The findings of this study suggest that backache is a common problem in the population of nurses in Pakistan. LBP is a widespread disease affecting nurses but not a major cause of sickness absence in the workplace. Poor knowledge of back care ergonomics and unavailability of lifting equipment are major predisposing factors to LBP among nurses (occupation hazard oriented).

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