Prevalência de dor musculoesquelética e associação ao transporte de material escolar em estudantes universitários

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Low back pain is a common complaint among adolescents and young adults from western industrialized countries and is the second most frequent cause of medical visits, behind only of questions related to respiratory conditions. Recent attention has been given to the role of backpacks in the development of idiopathic low back pain in adolescents and young adults. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the prevalence of musculoskeletal pain and its association with the transportation of school supplies in university students. METHODS: The present study was a cross-sectional, quantitative, descriptive, analytical and exploratory research, which evaluated 373 college students at the State University of Paraiba, Campina Grande / PB, from February to September in 2012. Data were collected through a questionnaire regarding sociodemographic, academic, transportation of school supplies and the presence of pain information, the measurement of anthropometric data and weighing of all the volumes transported by the individuals were performed. Data were tabulated and analyzed using descriptive and inferential software SPSS 17.0  . It was used a model of Hierarchical Binary Logistic Regression through Backward LR method, in which the power of influence of predictor variables divided into blocks was tested in the occurrence of the response variable: the presence of musculoskeletal pain. RESULTS: The study population had a pain prevalence of 82.84%, with overall average of 5.21 points in the pain visual analog scale (VAS). The results suggest that, in women, the influence of the relative mass of the volume on the presence of pain is 45.1% higher than among men (OR = 0.689, 95% CI = 0.503 to 0.942) for each 1% increment. The transportation time, in turn, increases the likelihood of experiencing pain in 22.9%, every 15 minutes (OR = 1.229, 95% CI = 1.090 to 1.386). CONCLUSION: There was a high prevalence of pain related to the transportation of school supplies and the influence of predictor variables such as relative weight of cargo and transport time of the material, especially in females.