Objectives: To quantify the prevalence and identify the associated factors of musculoskeletal pain among Saudi female school teachers.
Methods: An observational quantitative cross-sectional survey of female Saudi school teachers in five different areas of Saudi Arabia was carried out between August and October 2013. A self-administered questionnaire was used in which the items related to participants’ demographic information and pain information were included. A numeric pain rating scale was used for patient self-reporting of pain. Data analysis was carried out using SPSS Pc+ version 21.0 statistical software.
Results: Four hundred and eighty six female school teachers responded to the survey. Severe Low back pain was reported by 38.1% of teacher, followed by knee pain (26.3%), heel (24.1%), shoulder (20.6%), upper back (17.7%), hip joint (16.5%),ankle (12.3%), neck (11.3%). Sever pain of elbow (5.6%) and wrist (7.4%) was the least reported. Pain affected work at school in 46.1% of school teachers. A combination of variables: body mass index, Vitamin D deficiency, teaching level, presence of chronic illness, were found to be significantly associated with musculoskeletal pain.
Conclusion: The results of self-reported prevalence of musculoskeletal pain among female Saudi school teachers is useful to educate the school teachers for adequate care so as to prevent these pains. There is a need for the higher authorities to address this issue and implement intervention programs to alleviate the pain and suffering of these school teachers.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.