+Predictive Psychosocial Factors ...

"Findings from this study confirm the requirement for measurement of ‘depression and maladaptive cognitions’ in screening tools for patients at risk of developing persistent low back pain. • Psychological factors at baseline correlated with a progression to persistent low back pain up to 6 months. • The benefit of including factors such as ‘depression and maladaptive cognitions’ in screening tools is that these factors can be addressed in primary and secondary prevention"

+Multi-Site Pain ...

"The number of pain sites predicted poor work ability after 4 years of follow-up with a dose–response manner. Those with widespread pain had almost a 3-fold risk of developing poor work ability at follow-up. The associations were stronger for younger and white-collar workers....Counting the number of concurrent pain sites may be a simple method of identifying workers with high risk of work disability in occupational health practice."

"The number of pain sites independently predicted DP retirement. Employees with multisite pain may need specific support to maintain their work ability"

+Fear & Fear-Avoidance ...

"Individuals who had reported greater levels of fear avoidance beliefs when pain was acute also reported greater scores of disability six months later"

"Fear-avoidance beliefs have been shown to be associated with delayed return to work and increased sickness absence in longitudinal cohort studies"*

*"Mental health, work-related fear-avoidance beliefs and catastrophizing are all predictors of chronic work disability."

+Lifestyle Factors ...

Aerobic Exericse: "The performance of regular aerobic activities seems to reduce sickness absence and the recurrence of LBP whereas infrequent aerobic exercise leads to increased sickness absence"

Sleep: *"Those with sleep disturbances at baseline had a 2.4-fold risk of belonging to the new pain or chronic radiating pain cluster compared to pain-free participants."

Occupational health and safety personnel, as well as the [employees] themselves, should recognize sleep problems early enough in order to prevent back pain and its development into chronic pain.*

Self-reported restorative sleep was independently associated with the resolution of chronic widespread pain and return to musculoskeletal health"

"Insomnia symptoms was associated with a 1.40-fold increased risk of back pain"

+Social Support ...

"Job satisfaction and social support at work minimized the influence of sickness absence at baseline and at 1-year follow-up" "A correlation was observed between delayed workplace injury recovery and poor perceived workplace social support" "Workplace support was a significant moderate-to-strong predictor of days until to return to full capacity."

Social support was predictive of multi-site pain developing in all age groups except for the age group 60-64 years

+References ...

• Resources for preventing sickness absence due to low back pain, Occupational Medicine 2012
• Predicting the transition from acute to persistent low back pain, Occupational Medicine 2011
• Multi-site pain and work ability among an industrial population, Occupational Medicine 2011
• Sleep disturbances predict long-term changes in low back pain among Finnish firefighters: 13-year follow-up study, International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health 2015
• Restorative sleep predicts the resolution of chronic widespread pain: results from the EPIFUND study, Rheumatology 2008*
• Increased insomnia symptoms predict the onset of back pain among employed adults, PLoS 2014
• *Multisite musculoskeletal pain predicts medically certified disability retirement among Finns, European Journal of Pain 2015
• Resilience and Vulnerability Factors When Pain is Acute as Predictors of Disability: Findings From a Two-Year Longitudinal Study, Pain Medicine 2017
• Psychosocial Factors Impacting Workplace Injury Rehabilitation: Evaluation of a Concise Screening Tool, Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation, 2017