The Effect of Combined Core Stability and Sensory-motor Exercises on Pain, Performance and Movement Fear in Retired Male Athletes with Non-specific Chronic Low Back Pain

Low back pain is one of the important causes of early retirement in athletes. The purpose of this research was to study the effect of combined core stability and sensory-motor exercises on pain, performance, and movement fear in retired male athletes with non-specific chronic low back pain.

This study was a semi-experimental, and its design was two-groups with pretestposttest. Subjects were 30 retired male athletes with non-specific chronic low back pain that by double-blind method, randomly divided into two experimental and control groups. The visual analog scale of pain, Oswestry questionnaire, and Tampa scale were used for evaluating pain, disability and fear of movement, respectively. The experimental group performed eight-week core stability, and sensory-motor exercises and the control group did not experience any other treatment intervention. The Mann-Whitney U test was used for inter-group difference and Wilcoxon test for the intra-group difference at a significant level of p≤0.05.

The findings of the present study showed a significant reduction in the pain and fear of movement and an increase in the performance of retired male athletes with non-specific chronic low back pain after eight weeks of combined core stability and sensory-motor exercises.

It seems that increases in body core strength and stability with the extension of neuromuscular control resulting from improved function of proprioception following eight weeks of combined core stability and sensory-motor exercises may reduce pain and fear of movement and increases the performance in retired male athletes with non-specific chronic low back pain.