Prevalence of Sleep Disturbances in Patients with Chronic Low Back Pain between 25-60 Years of Age

Introduction: Low back pain is one of the most common multifactorial medical problems and causes a significant amount of disability and incapacity in different countries. It affects most adults in some point of their life. Poor sleep is known to cause a range of physiological and psychological effects. Over the long terms, these effects can become severe and lead to serious health conditions. Sleep disturbances has been found to have negative impacts on mood, pain severity experience and general quality of life.

Method: This is prospective cross-sectional survey of 60 patients of age between 25-60 years being evaluated for low back pain of greater than 6 months. The survey consisted of numerical pain rating scale (NPRS), Oswestry disability index (ODI), Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSIQ).

Results: There was significant relationship between pain and sleep. We found that 22 subjects out of 60 with the pain rate 7 to 9 showed 95.45% disturbances in sleep. While 33 subjects with pain rate 4 to 6 showed 70.27% sleep disturbed. According to PSIQ it was found that 50 individuals were having sleep disturbance with the percentage of 83.33%. While assessing the ODI, 37 individuals had moderate disability with 61.66%.

Conclusion: There is a high prevalence of sleep disorders among patients with chronic low back pain. Females are more sensitive to chronic low back pain but the percentage of sleep disturbance was found more in males due to exertional activities, abnormal postural habits. Sleep problems should be addressed as an integral part of pain management plan.