TITLE:
Ability of Therapists Trained in Mechanical Diagnosis and Therapy to Guess Pain Catastrophizing and Kinesiophobia Scores for Patients with Low Back Pain
AUTHORS:
Katsuya Suzuki, Hiroshi Takasaki
KEYWORDS:
History Taking, McKenzie Approach, Physical Evaluation, Post-Graduate Training, Psychological Status
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Therapy and Rehabilitation,
Vol.8 No.4,
August
28,
2020
ABSTRACT: Objective: To investigate whether a physical therapist trained
through the Mechanical Diagnosis and Therapy (MDT) diploma program could guess
psychological Patient Reported Outcome Measure (PROM) scores of individuals
with low back pain (LBP) by taking patient history and completing a physical
evaluation. Methods: Ten participants with LBP
completed PROMs immediately before history taking and again after a physical
evaluation. PROMs included the Pain Catastrophizing Scale (PCS), Tampa Scale
for Kinesiophobia (TSK), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, and Pain Coping
Strategy Questionnaire. A physical therapist who completed the MDT diploma
program took the patients’ history and completed their physical evaluation. The
therapist completed the same PROMs immediately after both history taking and
physical evaluation. Correlations between patient and therapist scores were
calculated using Spearman’s ρ. Results: Statistically significant positive correlations were detected in the PCS (ρ = 0.65) and TSK (ρ = 0.78) before
history taking, and in the PCS (ρ =
0.81) and TSK (ρ = 0.74) after
physical evaluation. Discussion: The results are based on one
MDT therapist and generalizability of the findings is limited. However, the
current preliminary findings justify the need for further studies to explore
effective post-graduate training to promote a patient centered approach.