mountain of painkillers needed for back pain

Mountain of analgesics needed to treat back pain – BackCare Awareness Week 10-16 October 2009

BackCare Awareness week is running from 10-16 October.

Here are some interesting statistics below about back pain:

• 52% of Britons currently suffer from back pain , costing the NHS around £480 million a year to treat.

• Nearly 5 million working days were lost as a result of back pain in 2003-04, meaning that on any one day 1% of the working population were on sickness leave due to a back problem , making back pain the largest single cause of work-related absence in Britain.

• Around 125,175,200 pain killers are consumed each year to treat back pain (men: 47, 667, 500, women: 77, 507, 700).

• 50% of back pain sufferers think their painkillers don’t last long enough and 41% of sufferers can’t sleep through the night when they have back pain

• Back pain causes more than physical discomfort with 29% of sufferers feeling depressed

• According to leading experts ‘self-management’ is the most effective treatment for the first ten days and they stress that it is important to keep mobile in the day and get a good night’s rest.

• According to back pain experts, there is a strong connection between stress and back pain. Stress causes a release of stress hormones and stress hormones increase the perception of pain.

• Increased pain can, in turn, lead to increased stress and depression creating a cycle of depression and pain that can be difficult to break.