Journal of Medical Society, RIMS Imphal - Regional Institute of ...

ORIGINAL ARTICLE‘t’ test was used to find out differencesbetween the groups on stressful life events,depression and chronic low back pain.ResultsOut of the 30 subjects in the study groups, 10were males and 20 females. Illiteratesconstituted 30% followed by under matric(23.33%), undergraduates (26.67%) andgraduate and above (20%). Majority of thesubjects (33%) were housewife and only16.67% were employed in the governmentestablishments. Again, 36.67% of subjectswere in the monthly income range of Rs.2001-4000 and only 13.33% of subjects werehaving income range of Rs 8000 and above.Majority of the subjects in the study group weremarried (73.33%). There were 22.23%unmarried subjects and 3.33% widower in thestudy group.Table I – Showing differences in Stressful Life Event Inventorysubscales among two groupsSubscale Study group Control group(n=30) (n=30)Mean SD Mean SDWork 1.07 1.63 1.17 1.29 0.26 > 0.05Education 1.2 1.815 0.57 0.76 1.75 > 0.05Marital 1.8 2.66 0.6 1.38 2.18 < 0.05Family 3.5 3.92 0.73 0.97 3.74 < 0.01Finance 3.6 3.04 1.27 1.36 3.82 < 0.01Health 6.6 3.895 2.43 1.84 5.28 < 0.001Bereavement 4.43 3.07 3.5 2.81 1.22 > 0.05Legal 0.87 1.3 0.7 1.07 0.53 > 0.05Table I shows that there are statisticallysignificant differences between the study andcontrol groups on marital, family, finance andhealth subscales of the Stressful Life EventInventory, however difference between thegroups in other subscales like work,bereavement and legal were insignificant.Table II – Frequency distribution of depression among studyand control groupsSubjects Not Depressed Mean ‘t’ ‘p’Depressed Mild Moderate Severe (SD)Study 4 15 7 4 18.4(7.27)group 9.61 < 0.001(n=30)Control 27 3 0 0 4.17(3.64)group(n=30)‘t’‘p’Table II shows frequency distribution ofdepression in both the groups. Twenty sixsubjects out of 30 in the study group werefound having associated depression against3 out of 30 subjects in the control group. Againin the study group, 15 persons were havingmild depression, 7 with moderate depressionand another 4 persons with severe depression.Difference between the two groups werestatistically significant (p < 0.001)DiscussionIn the present study, chronic low back paingroup experienced more negative life eventsthan the control group. This is in accordanceof findings of Saarijarvi et al 2 who reported thatmarital dissatisfaction in female CLBP patientswas significantly associated withpsychological distress and patient’s selfreported pain and disability.Naidoo P and Pillay YG 3 found that subjectswith chronic low back pain experienced morenegative life events and certain familycharacteristics (decreased score oncohesion, independence, organization andincreased scores of conflict) were unique tothat group.Finding of more score among chronic lowback pain patients on the “health’ subscale inthe present study was comparable with thefindings of Yip YB 4 who reported increasedrisk of low back pain among those patientswhose family members or relatives were verysick, needed their involvement to take care ofthem within the past 12 months.In the present study, the chronic low back paingroup had experienced significantly moresubjective units of distress than the controls.Craufurd DI 5 also found that before the onsetof back pain, there was significant excess ofadverse life events in those with definite onsetback pain of uncertain causes. Nwuga 6reported that life stressing events were foundto be correlated with pain factors. Lampe etal 7 also found that stressful life events anddepression had a significant impact on theoccurrence of chronic pain.The present study showed significantrelationship between chronic low back painand depression. Several researchers likeJMS * Vol 25 * No. 2 * May, 2011 65