Chronic non-specific low back pain disability and depressive symptoms in working men and women: a cross-sectional study

Chronic non-specific low back pain (LBP) is a serious public health issue that impairs the functional abilities of working men and women. The burden and experience of chronic non-specific LBP are largely influenced by psychological and psychosocial aspects. The objective was to investigate the association between the severity of chronic non-specific LBP disability and depressive symptoms in a sample of Croatian working active men and women with an age distribution from 35 to 65 years. The Roland Morris Disability Questionnaire (RMDQ) assessed disability, whereas the Beck Depression Inventory-II assessed depressive symptoms. During the routine outpatient visit self-reported RMDQ and BDI-II were completed from 203 recruited patients, divided into categories concerning disability scores. The median (IQR) age of 48.59 +/- 6.48 was in the lower and the median (IQR) age of 50.65 +/- 7.68 in the higher disability category. Disability was significantly associated (p < 0.05) with higher age (r = 0.177), working experience (r = 0.161), LBP duration (r = 0.195), greater pain intensity (r = 0.474 during activity, r = 0.227 at rest), and BDI-II score (r = 0.466). Higher BDI-II scores were associated with confirmatory answers on the 15th, 19th, and 22nd questions in RMDQ (p < 0.05). In patients with chronic non-specific LBP, higher degrees of disability were linked to severe depressive symptoms, aging, longer working experience, and increased pain intensity. These findings support pretreatment screening for depressive symptoms in order to develop individually customized and efficient multidisciplinary therapies.