A new survey of physicians who regularly treat back pain, the second most common reason people visit a doctor, reveals that there are significant differences between men and women when it comes to identifying the causes of their discomfort.
Nearly half (47 percent) of the 200 primary care physicians who participated in the FLEXERIL® 5 mg SPASM (Survey of Physicians About Sufferers of Musculoskeletal Pain) survey, report that the majority of male patients with acute back pain attribute their symptoms to a job related injury. In contrast, more than one-third (37 percent) of doctors say women most often complain of back pain associated with activities around the home, such as housework, gardening or childcare.
"The source of acute low back pain is not always clear, but the majority of episodes result in muscle spasm," said Gerard Malanga, M.D., director of Sports, Spine and Orthopedic Rehabilitation, Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation in West Orange, New Jersey. "The good news, however, is that with the appropriate treatment, nearly 90 percent of patients will fully recover in about two months."
On average, 58 percent of physicians say they treat their patients with acute back pain by prescribing a muscle relaxant, such as FLEXERIL® (cyclobenzaprine HCl) 5 mg, at some point in their therapy. More than half of the responding physicians (52 percent) believe that patients who take a muscle relaxant return to normal activities sooner than those who do not take one. Three in four physicians surveyed believe patients expect to resume normal activity within six days of beginning treatment, although the doctors expect it will take about seven-13 days.
"Rest periods longer than two days have not been shown to be effective, and can actually slow recovery from back pain," said Dr. Malanga. "The sooner a back pain sufferer obtains relief, the sooner normal activity can be resumed."
Doctors also report that men complain of exercise and sports-related back pain injuries more often than women, and the two genders identify different activities as the source of their discomfort. By far, physicians cite weight lifting (46 percent) as the most common exercise-related cause of acute back pain for men, followed by golf (18 percent), basketball (10 percent) and football (nine percent). More than one-third (37 percent) of physicians say their female patients identify running as the most common exercise related cause of their back pain, followed by tennis (15 percent) and weight lifting (14 percent).
Other findings from the SPASM survey reveal: