The impact of rehabilitation on pain complaints and functional efficiency of low back pain syndrome patients that resided at the CRR KRUS Center in Iwonicz Zdrój

Background
Spinal pain is one of the most com- mon conditions affecting young and middle-aged people and negatively affecting their quality of life. There are missing data about the risk of lumbosa- cral spine pain in Polish farmers and the lack of up-to-date research, as well as the impact of reha- bilitation holidays on lumbosacral spine pain and the level of functional performance.

Aims
The study aimed to evaluate the pain com- plaints and functional performance of patients with lumbosacral spinal pain syndrome before and after a three-week rehabilitation program. The effects of gender, body mass index (BMI), and Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) on the incidence of pain and the results of functional tests in the subjects were also compared.

Material and methods
The study involved 90 pa- tients undergoing sanatorium treatment who re- ported low back pain. All subjects were examined twice with three functional tests, and the pain level was assessed using the VAS scale (Measure 1 – before physiotherapy and Measure 2 – 3 weeks after physiotherapy).

Results
After three weeks of physical therapy, there was a decrease in the average level of per- ceived pain from 5 (± 1.15) to 4 (± 1.69) in the VAS scale and a slight decrease from 1.16 (± 0.20) to 1.14 (± 0.22) of the mean lower limb symmetry in- dex (SI) in Two Scale Test (TST). The average time needed to perform the Timed Up and Go (TUG) was reduced by 0.82 seconds, and the average distance in the Fingertip-to-Floor (FTF) test was reduced by 6.48 cm.

Conclusions
The data collected confirms that the three-week rehabilitation camp impacted reduc- ing the level of pain and increasing the level of functional performance. It was also shown that BMI and pain level affected the functional per- formance tests.