Abstract
Japanese institutionalized children with mental and physical handicaps who have now become middle aged and are more difficult to manage. Low back pain is now on significant condition for the staff who take care of these patients. So we have investigated the condition of low back pain among 87 staff members (71women and 16men) in a hospital for mentally and physically handicapped patients. The mean staff age was 45 years, ranging from 23 to 63 years, and the mean length of service was 14 years. All the staff were examined using X-ray of the lumbar spine, the JOA score, and others. 71 staff complained of low back pain, especially when in a half sitting position and lifting patients. X-ray findings were not related to low back pain. However, there were increased degenerative lumbar changes in staff over fifty. Based on these findings the author suggested 4 points to prevent low back pain and emphasized to reduce the amount of lifting for staff.
