Walking can help back pain

Education Series by Randy Hebert, MD, Medical Director

Almost 700 million people worldwide experience low back pain at some point. Seventy percent will have recurrent back pain. Unfortunately, back pain often comes and goes and many pain medications are not very effective.

There is something we can do, however, to lower the chance of back pain becoming chronic—walking.

Walking as little as 30 minutes a day, three days a week markedly decreases the chance of back pain coming back.

Simple things can work.

Pocovi, Natasha C., et al. “Effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of an individualised, progressive walking and education intervention for the prevention of low back pain recurrence in Australia (WalkBack): a randomised controlled trial.” The Lancet (2024).