Effect of Six Weeks of TRX Exercise on General and Specific Motor Function and Quality of Life of Middle-aged Women With Lumbar Motor Control Impairment

Impaired control of trunk movement is one of the important mechanisms involved in the occurrence of chronic back pain. The present study aims to investigate the effect of six weeks of TRX exercise on general and specific motor function and quality of life (QoL) of middle-aged women with lumbar motor control impairment.

This is a quasi-experimental study with a pre-test/post-test design using a control group. Participants were 30 middle-aged women with lumbar motor control impairment who were selected purposefully based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria and randomly classified into two groups of intervention and control, and quality of life by the 36-Item short form survey. General motor function was evaluated by functional movement screening (FMS) tests and specific motor function was evaluated by Luomajoki lumbar movement control dysfunction screening tests before and after the intervention. The intervention group received a TRX exercise program for six weeks (three sessions per week, each for 45 minutes), while the control group performed routine daily activities during this period. Data analysis was performed in SPSS software, version 21 using paired t-tests and ANCOVA. The significance level was set at 0.05.

The mean score of all variables related to general motor function (Cohen’s d=0.88-1.50), specific motor function (Cohen’s d=0.95-2.7), and quality of life (Cohen’s d=1.65) improved significantly in the experimental group from pre-test to post-test phase (P<0.05), but there was no significant change in the control group (P>0.05). The ANCOVA results showed that the means of all variables in the post-test phase were significantly higher in the TRX group compared to the control group (P<0.05).

Six weeks of TRX exercise improve the general and specific motor function and QoL of middle-aged women with lumbar motor control impairment. It is recommended that physical therapy and corrective exercise specialists use these exercise to improve the function of middle-aged women with lumbar motor control impairment.