Health related quality of life of patients with low back pain undergoing physiotherapy at Mulago National Referral Hospital

Abstract

Background Low back pain remains a big problem and affects activities of daily living. Physiotherapy remains the main stay of conservative management for patients with LBP. The health related quality of life (HRQOL) of patients with LBP undergoing physiotherapy treatment according to most studies done in the west is well documented and has shown good results at durations between 9-12 weeks, this is however not the case in our setting as there is paucity of data in that regard. Objective The study’s primary objective was to determine the health related quality of life (HRQOL) in patients with LBP undergoing Physiotherapy treatment at Mulago national referral hospital. Methodology This was a hospital based cross sectional study involving 130 adult participants with low back pain undergoing physiotherapy treatment. Short form-36 (SF-36) questionnaires was used to capture HRQOL data after which was analyzed into summary statistics and by Linear regression to determine associations between continuous outcome variables and characteristics of interest in this research. The sample size calculation by formula was 119 participants using formula for estimations of sample size with outcomes in means and Standard deviations. Results A total of 130 participants were enrolled in this study of which males were 52 (40%) and females 78 (60%).The overall average health related quality of life was generally above average (51.8 with SD 13.7) Females had better mean scores for HRQOL 56.7 (14.4) compared to male counterparts 48.6 (12.4). Having a chronic illness: Beta coefficient 5.16 (95% CI; 0.33 to 7.99, P= 0.037) and gender: Beta coefficient 7.00 (95% CI; 2.25 to 11.74, P= 0.004) were found to be independent predictors of HRQOL. Conclusions The overall HRQOL of patients with low back pain undergoing physiotherapy at Mulago national referral hospital was good with females much better than males, having chronic illness was a poor prognostic factor for HRQOL. Type of physiotherapy did not affect HRQOL.