Effect of Health Education on Posture Practices Towards Reduction of Low Back Pain Among Patients in Rivers State

Abstract

This study investigated the effect of health education on posture practices in reducing low back pain among patients in Rivers state, Nigeria. To achieve this, pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design was employed, and the study targeted 170 patients at the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital in Nigeria. Two objectives having corresponding research questions and hypotheses guided the study, while convenience and stratified sampling techniques were used to select 50 participants, comprising 35 patients from the general outpatient clinic department and 15 patients from the spine physiotherapy unit, with 20 male and 30 female participants. Data collection was done by administering a self-structured, self-administered questionnaire, titled health education effect on ergonomic practices and low back pain, which had a reliability coefficient of 0.75. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were used to answer the research questions and test the hypotheses. The research found that educating patients on various methods of preventing low back pain, including healthy weight maintenance, warm-up exercises, and proper postural habits while sitting and standing, had a noteworthy impact on reducing pain. Moreover, the study also revealed that health education programmes were successful in therapeutic posture practices and reducing low back pain in patients residing in Rivers state. Therefore, the study concluded and recommended that health education interventions for functional and therapeutic posture practices are effective strategies for reducing low back pain among patients in Rivers state, and healthcare providers should incorporate these interventions into their treatment plans for patients suffering from low back pain.