Long walks may help reduce risk of chronic lower back pain: Study

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Get out your favourite walking shoes and go on an extended stroll.

Researchers found people who went on very long walks — more than 100 minutes each day — were nearly 25% less likely to have chronic lower back pain than those who sauntered for less than 78 minutes per day.

According to a study published last month in the JAMA Network Open, people who saw the best benefits were not necessarily those who walked the quickest or with the most intensity.

“The more people walked, the lower their risk,” said Rayane Haddadj, of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, reported Science News.

However, researchers noticed people who walked for more than 100 minutes didn’t see any extra health benefits.

According to the World Health Organization, the leading cause of disability around the world is lower back pain.

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Haddadj sought to learn if daily physical activities such as taking a stroll and the intensity of walking had any effect on the risks of developing lower back pain.

He and his researchers analyzed data from 11,194 participants with an average age of 55 who didn’t report having any chronic lower back pain. They attached movement-tracking devices to their bodies for up to a week to determine walking habits.

About four years later, about 1,700 said they had back issues.

Researchers discovered that the group of people who walked more than 100 minutes per day were 23% less likely to have chronic lower back pain.

While it hinted that a higher volume of walking helped decrease the risk of chronic lower back pain, Haddadj cautioned the research didn’t prove it because walking habits may have changed over the four years.

And because the study was observational, the cause and effect can’t be fully established.

“These findings suggest that policies and public health strategies promoting walking could help to reduce the occurrence of chronic (lower back pain),” the study’s authors concluded.

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