Effectiveness of a Back Care Intervention on Spine-related Behavior among Female students: a schoolbased randomized controlled trial

Back pain is a major public health problem among adolescents and in particular among pupils. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of a back care intervention on spine-related behavior among female students.

Method and Materials: 

This randomized quasi-experimental study was conducted on female students who were studying in high schools of Babolsar, Iran. Just intervention group received the peer educational program. However, the control group received no intervention. The data were collected by a valid questionnaire regarding backpack carrying . Effective factors in two time points of initial of the study and 6-month follow up were assessed. The data were analyzed by SPSS software version 21 at a significance level of 0.05.

Totally, 92 students including 46 students in intervention group and 46 students in control group participated in the study. According the findings of the study, mean ± standard deviation of backpack weight before the intervention was (6.14 ± 0.57), ratio of backpack weight to student weight was (0.1 ± 0.01) and backpack carrying duration was (132.6 ± 46.81) which all these variables six months after the intervention reduced to 4.09 ± 0.92; 0.06 ± 0.02 and 93.36 ± 58.06 respectively (P <0.001). The percentage of bilateral backpack carrying in the experimental group increased from 32.6% (n= 15) to 73.9% (n= 34) (P <0.001). However, no significant difference regarding mentioned variables was observed in the control group (P <0.05). The effect size of the intervention was moderate to large (0.4-0.6).

Peer educational interventions could be effective for improving back pack carrying behavior. However, doing more interventional researches in future is recommended.