Low back pain among school teachers in Botswana, prevalence and risk factors

Table 6 Individual factors associated with LBP disability among Botswana school teachers

Risk factors^a	Minimal disability	Moderate/severe disability/crippled	Total	P value
	%	%	%
Gender				<0.001
Male	27.7	14.5	23.3
Female	72.3	85.5	76.7
Age				<0.001
≤30	23.5	13.3	20.2
31-40	38.4	35.3	37.4
41-50	29.1	40.1	32.7
>50	9.0	11.3	9.7
Body mass index				<0.001
<18.5	5.6	4.1	5.1
18-24.9	46.3	30.3	41.1
25-29.9	27.2	33.0	29.1
≥30	21.0	32.6	24.7
Marital status				0.337
Single	52.7	47.9	51.1
Married	41.7	45.1	42.8
Separated/divorced/widowed	5.6	6.9	6.0
Educational level				<0.001
Certificate	3.7	7.6	5.0
Diploma	55.5	64.0	58.3
Bachelors’ degree	40.8	28.4	36.7
Number of children less than 6 years				1.000
1	72.3	71.8	72.2
≥2	27.7	28.2	27.8
Previous injury				<0.001
No	88.3	74.4	83.7
Yes	11.7	25.6	16.3
Tobacco smoking				0.022
Never smoked	91.0	95.6	92.5
Ex-smokers	6.2	2.5	5.0
Current Smokers	2.8	1.9	2.5
Hours of physical exercise per week (h)				0.700
≤5	88.8	90.1	89.2
>5	11.2	9.9	10.8
School level				<0.001
Primary school	55.0	69.7	59.9
Junior secondary	33.2	25.2	30.6
Senior secondary	11.7	5.0	9.5
Length of employment (years)				0.001
≤10	50.9	38.5	46.8
11-20	32.0	37.2	33.7
21-30	15.3	20.2	16.9
>30	1.9	4.1	2.6
Working hours per week (hours)				1.000
40	85.0	85.2	85.1
>40	15.0	14.8	14.9
Number of children taught				0.060
≤25	12.8	8.2	11.3
26-30	15.5	14.8	15.2
31-35	28.3	30.6	29.0
36-40	32.5	38.5	34.4
>40	11.0	7.9	10.0
Extracurricular activities				0.309
No	35.1	33.9	33.9
Yes	64.9	68.5	66.1

^aStatistical associations between independent variables and LBP disability was evaluated using chi-squared. Statistically significant differences (p<0.05) are marked in bold.

ISSN: 1471-2474