If you’ve never experienced low back pain yourself, you almost certainly know somebody who has.

Around four million Australians experience this kind of pain. It is a leading cause of disability worldwide and is known to reduce people’s quality of life.

Researchers from Macquarie University have been exploring the effectiveness of a surprisingly simple intervention: walking, paired with education.

The WalkBack program

Dr Tash Pocovi is a Research Fellow at the Spinal Pain Research Centre. She’s the lead researcher behind WalkBack, a program which pairs walking and education and aims to reduce recurring low back pain.

“We don’t know exactly why walking is so good for preventing back pain,” she says. “But it is likely to include the combination of gentle movement, loading and strengthening the spinal structures and muscles, relaxation and stress relief, and the release of ‘feel-good’ endorphins.”

The world-first trial of WalkBack had people take part in a tailored walking and education program facilitated by a physiotherapist, across six education sessions. The focus was on making walking a regular habit and to slowly progress the duration, frequency and intensity over time.

In the trial, participants walked three to five times a week over a period of six months and had fewer recurrences of activity-limiting pain compared to a control group. Additionally, this simple walking and education program reduced healthcare-seeking behaviours related to low back pain.

Developing an online version

WalkBack recently received a $100,000 grant in the latest round of funding from the Medibank Better Health Research Hub. The grant will be used to aid the development and testing of an online version of the program.

“The idea was always to explore opportunities to deliver WalkBack at scale,” says Dr Pocovi. “We felt that our program could lend itself to an online format.”

After the success of the trial, Pocovi, Professor Mark Hancock and their research team spoke with colleagues, clinicians and patients with low back pain about what a digital version of the program might look like.

The research team will be working with people with lived experience of low back pain to help co-design the online program. It’s a chance for patients to have their say.

“The key ingredients from the main trial – the progressive walking program, pain education and health coaching – will be retained but there is flexibility in how this might look, so consumer input is essential,” Dr Pocovi says.

Once the online version has been developed, Medibank funding will allow for the crucial next step of testing WalkBack Online.

“We’ll conduct a trial comparing the new Walkback Online program to no intervention and see whether we still see similar benefits to our previous, physiotherapist-delivered program,” says Dr Pocovi. “If successful, we hope this lends itself to being scaled and offered to low back pain patients across Australia.”