Cheshire patients to be asked to volunteer for major back pain clinical trial
UP to 800 patients in east Cheshire are to be invited to take part in a major clinical trial into persistent back pain.
Researchers at the Arthritis Research Campaign's Epidemiology Unit at Manchester University are hoping to find out whether education, exercise and self-help techniques can help reduce patients' pain and disability.
The study could have major implications in the way that persistent back pain is managed at primary care level throughout the country.
Patients attending GP surgeries in Wilmslow, Knutsford, Congleton and Macclesfield will be asked to take part in the 12-month study, which is being funded by a £120,000 grant from the ARC.
Patients must be aged between 18 and 65 and be suffering from a new attack of back pain. They must also have been pain-free for the past six months.
"Low back pain is a major health problem in the in the UK and each year seven per cent of the population goes to the doctor because of it," explained Gary Macfarlane, Professor of Epidemiology at the EU.
"In many patients, this back pain gets better within three months of this initial visit. However, up to 50 per cent of patients continue to have pain and disability after this time, and it's these patients whose symptoms persist who primarily contribute to the large direct and indirect costs of this condition."
Patients to be recruited into the study will be sent a questionnaire three months after their GP consultation to determine whether they still have disabling back pain. If they have, they will be split into two randomised groups of around 100 people. One group will attend a six-week rehabilitation programme, which consists of an individual one-hour assessment followed by eight group sessions of two hours, and will be held at one of three hospitals in the area; Macclesfield District General, the War Memorial, Congleton, and Knutsford and District Community.
During these sessions, which will be run by two physiotherapists, the patients will be encouraged to develop ways of managing and dealing with their back pain through exercise and self-help techniques.
The other group will be given written information on back pain, and information on audiotape, which will help them understand their pain, what causes it, and what they can do to help their condition.
Both sets of patients will be asked to complete a short questionnaire one month after the end of the programme, then after six and 12 months to find out if their back pain has improved or not.
The Arthritis Research Campaign is the fifth biggest medical research charity in the UK and in the past 12 months raised almost £22m from public donations to fund research into all forms of the disease.
The University of Manchester, in particular the Epidemiology Unit, is a leading centre of ARC-funded research, and is currently in receipt of several million pounds.
