Background and aim: Recovery of patients with chronic low back pain (LBP) is depended on several physical and psychological factors. Therefore, the authors aimed to examine the efficacy of mindfulness based stress reduction (MBSR) as a mind-body intervention on quality of life and pain severity of female patients with nonspecific chronic LBP (NSCLBP).
Methods: Eighty-eight patients diagnosed as NSCLBP by physician and randomly assigned to experimental (MBSR+ usual medical care) and the control group (usual medical care only). The subjects assessed in 3 times frames; before, after and 4 weeks after intervention by Mac Gil pain and standard brief quality of life scales. Data obtained from the final sample analyzed by ANCOVA using SPSS software.
Results: The findings showed MBSR was effective in reduction of pain severity and the patients who practiced 8 sessions meditation reported significantly lower pain than patients who only received usual medical care. There was a significant effect of the between subject factor group (F [1, 45] = 16.45, P < 0.001) and (F [1, 45] = 21.51, P < 0.001) for physical quality of life and (F [1, 45] = 13.80, P < 0.001) and (F [1, 45] = 25.07, P < 0.001) mental quality of life respectively.
Conclusion: MBSR as a mind-body therapy including body scan, sitting and walking meditation was effective intervention on reduction of pain severity and improvement of physical and mental quality of life of female patients with NSCLBP.
Keywords: Chronic low back pain; SF-12; mindfulness based stress reduction; pain; quality of life.