Female Gender Is Associated with a Higher Prevalence of Chronic Neck Pain, Chronic Low Back Pain, and Migraine: Results of the Spanish National Health Survey, 2017

Abstract

Objectives To assess the prevalence of chronic neck pain (CNP), chronic low back pain (CLBP), and migraine headache (MH) in the Spanish population and to identify sociodemographic and health-related variables associated with CNP, CLBP, and MH. Design Observational study. Setting Spain. Subjects A total of 22,511 persons 18 years of age or older (10,304 males and 12,207 females) who participated in the 2017 Spanish National Health Survey. Methods Stratified three-stage sampling was applied. CNP, CLBP, and MH were the dependent variables. The analysis was conducted separately by gender. Sociodemographic features, self-perceived health status, lifestyle habits, comorbidities, and pain features were analyzed by using logistic regression models. Results Females reported a higher prevalence of CNP, CLBP, and MH (P < 0.001) than males. For both sexes, anxiety and/or depression and poor self-rated health were associated with a significantly increased prevalence of CNP, CLBP, and MH. For CNP and CLBP, the identified associated factors were older age and limitations to usual activity. For CNP and MH, the most common associated factor was comorbid respiratory disease. Conclusions Our study identified several factors associated with CNP, CLBP, and MH in Spanish female and male adults, with potential implications for health care providers.

The prevalence and risk factors of chronic low back pain among adults in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa: an observational cross-sectional hospital-based study

“…The current study showed that excessive and frequent consumption of alcohol was a significant predictor of CLBP. This is in line with the results found by Palacios-Ceña et al [ 28 ].…”

“…Stratified by gender, the present study showed a higher prevalence of CLBP among females 19.8% than males 15.9%. This is consistent with the findings of several other studies which showed an overall higher prevalence of CLBP among females than males [ 28 , 29 ]. Interestingly, the present study showed that males of the age category 38 – 47 years, had a higher CLBP prevalence than their female counterpart, 19.3 and 15.9%, respectively.…”

“…Based on the multivariate analysis, this study showed that increasing age was not a significant predictor of CLBP. This is contrary to the findings of other cross-sectional studies [ 3 , 15 , 16 , 28 , 29 ].. On the other hand to this finding, Knauer et al [ 29 ], reported that the prevalence of CLBP decreased in the elderly population. .…”

Medial Prefrontal Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Aimed to Improve Affective and Attentional Modulation of Pain in Chronic Low Back Pain Patients

“…In addition, affective manipulation reliably produced the desired affective state but did not have reliable effects on pain ratings. The sample was also primarily (75%) female, precluding sex comparisons, but given the well-established differences in e.g., chronic pain prevalence [ 64 ], the role of psychological factors [ 65 ], and CPM stability [ 66 ] between sexes, future studies should take this into consideration as some effects of affect manipulation and HD-tDCS may be sex-specific. Further, although this study was placebo-controlled, it lacked a healthy control group, which would have allowed for evaluation of how much the patients’ response, to the CPM paradigm, different manipulations, and HD-tDCS, deviated from normal.…”

Has the Phase of the Menstrual Cycle Been Considered in Studies Investigating Pressure Pain Sensitivity in Migraine and Tension-Type Headache: A Scoping Review

“…For instance, studies comparing pain sensitivity between women with TTH or migraine and headache-free women should assess all participating women in the same phase of the cycle (e.g., menstruation-bleeding, luteal phase, ovulation, or follicular phase) to decrease the influence of the menstrual cycle on pain sensitivity between the comparisons. This is highly relevant since both TTH and migraine are more prevalent in women and gender differences are commonly seen [ 22 , 23 ].…”