Being active in nature can help people with chronic back pain, researchers say
Now, researchers say people may find relief from these and other negative effects of the condition by heading outdoors.
Nature offers an escape from the pain, in addition to enabling them to connect with others on a social level, researchers claim. Furthermore, the natural features, including the sound of running water and fresh air, helped to give them a feeling of tranquillity that relieved the stresses and anxieties created by their pain levels.
'Our research showed that those able to get out into nature saw the benefits of doing so, both from a physical and a mental perspective,' Dr. Alexander Smith, a researcher in the University of Plymouth's School of Psychology, said in a statement.
Smith is the lead author of the small study which was published Tuesday in the Journal of Pain.
The study, which is the first of its kind, asked people experiencing chronic lower back pain – in some cases for nearly 40 years – about the role nature plays in their coping strategies. Its conclusions were based on interviews with 10 people who had experienced chronic lower back pain for between five and 38 years.
The research follows previous work highlighting the benefits of nature in fighting stress and promoting mental health. Another study showed that exposure to nature can regulate the sympathetic nervous system in as little as five minutes. Mindfulness-based therapy has also been shown to be effective.
'This means that we can get an almost immediate benefit from stepping outside,' Mayo Clinic nurse practitioner Jodie Smith explained. And doing so on a recurrent basis may prevent cumulative effects from stress, which could mean a lower risk for chronic disease, illness and mortality.'
But, people with chronic back pain may need to be more cautious when heading out on a hike.
Hiking with an incorrect technique and with improper equipment, such as an ill-fitted backpack, can have a detrimental impact, Dr. Eric Freeman, an interventional spine and pain specialist at Redefine Healthcare in New Jersey, warned.
Still, it can also fortify the health of people with back pain.
'Hiking is a good activity for those who suffer from back pain because it helps increase muscular circulation, which improves soft tissue flexibility in the spine as well as other large muscle groups. Hiking also helps strengthen the muscles that support your spine and improves flexibility and posture, resulting in minimized osteoarthritis pain,' he said.
Uneven terrain was a factor the study participants said they were commonly worried about, but walking on such terrains can also contribute to improved balance and muscle activity.
Based on these findings, the researchers said they recommend that people with chronic lower back pain and their doctors give greater consideration to the role nature can play in their health and wellbeing. They also recommended that natural spaces become more accessible.
'Simple changes, such as better paths and seating, and technological innovations including virtual reality may help make those benefits accessible to everyone. But we hope our findings open the door to greater exploration of how that might be achieved,' Dr. Smith said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
5 minutes ago
- The Independent
‘You can literally pregame recess with these': Experts warn of caffeine pouches targeting teens
Last summer, a TikTok user shared a video responding to a commenter asking if 13-year-olds can use caffeine pouches. The pouches, which are placed between your cheeks and gums to absorb the stimulant directly, have become increasingly popular amongst teens. 'Yes, guys, you can literally pregame recess with these,' the video creator says, holding up a tin of LyvWel 'Cherry Blast' caffeine pouches. There are a lot of similar videos all over TikTok. 'Can a 13-year-old use or buy upper-deckies from the TikTok shop? Yeah, of course you can,' a different user said, referencing the popular online nickname for pouch products. 'These are literally just caffeine pouches.' There is no national age restriction on caffeine in the U.S., so anyone can purchase products that contain the stimulant. Caffeine use in kids can even result in a hospital trip, which is rare but on the rise. The number of children ages 11 to 14 who had to visit the emergency room due to a caffeine overdose doubled between 2017 and 2023, according to a November 2024 study. And experts are getting increasingly concerned about the impact of caffeine on children, and the marketing tactics that could expose kids to these products. Dr. Michael Garcia, an internal medicine doctor with a focus on nutrition at UCLA Health, told The Independent that 'less is more' when it comes to caffeine for adolescents. Long-term use among teens can increase blood pressure, worsen anxiety and impact sleep, he explained. 'We know caffeine is one of those things our body can develop tolerance to,' Garcia said. 'So little by little, maybe use increases as that tolerance develops. And it's like any other stimulant or substance that gives us some sort of immediate effect, we then depend on it ... long-term.' The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests 100mg as the upper limit for kids 12-18, which is about the equivalent of a cup of drip coffee, about two cans of Diet Coke, or one energy drink. There are several other companies that sell caffeine pouches, including Deckiez, Rebel Pouches, and Wip, a caffeine pouch start-up founded by Richard Mumby, a strategic investor and marketing executive who worked with the e-cigarette company Juul. Different brands have different amounts of caffeine: many of LyvWel's pouches contain 56mg per pouch, which is roughly equivalent to a can of soda. Deckiez sells pouches with 40mg and 50mg of caffeine. Wip sells products with 100mg and 200mg of caffeine per pouch, with 15 pouches per package. Wip's Instagram features influencers over 18 promoting the products while doing athletic activities, including surfing, skateboarding and weightlifting. Rebel Pouches' Instagram shows men playing golf, softball and running, amongst other sports. Deckiez, founded by a teenager and his father, shows the now-college student founder talking with other young men, and shows people snowboarding and playing softball. LyvWel's focuses on discount prices and flavor variety. Dr. Robert Jackler, founder of the Stanford Research Into the Impact of Tobacco Advertising group, tells The Independent he's concerned social media marketing tactics could make teens eager to try the products, pointing out Wip's use of sports teens are particularly attracted to. 'These videos of the skateboarder doing his tricks…I mean, there may be 50-year-olds and 30-year-olds who are interested in that, but it clearly has a differential interest amongst young people,' he said. Dr. Bonnie Halpern-Felsher, a developmental psychologist at Stanford Medicine, also argued that using influencers and sporty imagery indicates it's 'clearly being marketed to young people.' 'You could talk about users on the way to the office, on the way to a business meeting…that would be much more obvious that you're targeting adults,' she said. 'There's nothing that I can see of the sort here. It is all fun and games.' However, caffeine pouch companies claim that they only aim their products to over-18s and, there's age-related warnings on the tin. Wip rejects any suggestion that they have advertised to underage children, with the company noting that its packaging is designed to appeal to adults and that hiring influencers is normal marketing practice. The product also includes age and usage recommendations, including a warning that says Wip is intended for people 18 and older. 'Wip has adopted an exceptionally proactive and responsible marketing approach, grounded in and exceeding official health authority guidelines,' the company said in a statement to The Independent. Deckiez founders Dean and Mike Herkenrath noted that their product was created 'as a healthier alternative to the huge spike in nicotine pouch use' and pointed out that caffeine has some health benefits for adults. For instance, studies have shown that adult coffee drinkers are less likely to develop heart failure, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine. 'Many of our customers have quit or heavily reduced their nicotine pouch consumption and we're very proud of that,' the Herkenraths said in a statement. 'Our social media content is indented for success minded young adults to ageless at heart seeking to energize their goals!' LyvWel said in a statement to The Independent that the TikTok creators encouraging 13-year-olds to try their caffeine pouches are not affiliated with the company, and appear to be using 'TikTok's Affiliate Program, which allows any user regardless of age to tag and promote TikTok shop products without brand involvement or approval.' The company says it has tried to report 'several inappropriate videos,' but some haven't been taken down. The Independent has contacted TikTok for comment. As interest in caffeine pouches grows, Dr. Grace Kong, a psychiatry professor at Yale Medicine who specializes in child and adolescent psychology, told The Independent that adolescents don't have all the tools they need to make informed decisions about caffeinated products, especially those they find on social media. 'There is an issue if we're targeting that kind of advertising or marketing to teens for those substances, because teens are still minors,' she told The Independent. 'There still needs to be protection in some way about the decision-making.' She noted that she thinks caffeine pouches are too similar in design to nicotine pouches, which could encourage young people to try them. 'It could be a gateway, or it could really normalize pouch use,' Kong said. There's also concern about how the caffeine is being delivered through these pouches, Dr. Taylor Argo, an adolescent medicine fellow at the University of Michigan, told The Independent. 'There are lots of blood vessels right there, and so that caffeine is being absorbed directly into the bloodstream…we hypothesize that when you put medicines directly into your mouth that way, or other substances, it's absorbed a little faster,' she said. The 'biggest risk factor' for teens when using high levels of caffeine is irregular heart rates, also known as cardiac arrhythmias, Argo said. 'I actually have not heard of any of my patients using these, and I care for teens every day…I do worry about the amount of caffeine that is in it and how it's being delivered,' she added. Garcia encourages parents to talk about caffeine products with their teens and learn why they might want to use them. 'I think as adults, we are always inclined to provide a solution, but I think there's a lot of value in listening,' he said.
The Independent
5 minutes ago
- The Independent
What the heck is ‘scrumping'? Why humans are so good at digesting alcohol
Craving a glass of wine with your dinner? The dietary habits of our ape ancestors may be to blame. To better understand the relationship between humans and alcohol, researchers are studying the animals' fondness for fermented and fallen fruit, newly referred to as 'scrumping.' "Scrumping by the last common ancestor of gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans about 10 million years ago could explain why humans are so astoundingly good at digesting alcohol," Nathaniel Dominy, the Charles Hansen Professor of Anthropology at Dartmouth College, said in a statement. "We evolved to metabolize alcohol long before we ever figured out how to make it, and making it was one of the major drivers of the Neolithic Revolution that turned us from hunter-gatherers into farmers and changed the world,' he added. Fermentation is the process by which bacteria and other microorganisms break down sugars into substances such as alcohols or acids. All of the alcohol we drink is made this way. When you drink alcohol, you get drunk because you're consuming faster than your metabolism can handle. In apes, researchers said this doesn't seem to be the case. Geneticists previously reported that eating fermented fruit may have led to a biological change in the last common ancestor of humans and African apes that boosted their ability to metabolize alcohol by 40 times. However, no one had the data to test it, and scientists had not differentiated fruit in the trees from that on the ground when studying the primates since then. "It just wasn't on our radar," Dominy explained. "It's not that primatologists have never seen scrumping — they observe it pretty regularly. But the absence of a word for it has disguised its importance.' The team wanted to know what significance scrumping had for human evolution so analyzed previous research on dietary habits of orangutans, chimpanzees, and mountain and western gorillas in the wild. The studies included thousands of scans of the primates eating fruit. If an ape at ground level was recorded eating fruit known to grow in the middle or upper levels of the forest canopy, it was counted as scrumping. Of the three species, African apes were found to 'scrump' regularly, while orangutans did not. To better understand chimpanzees' alcohol consumption, the researchers will next measure the levels of fermentation in fruits in trees, versus that on the ground. The researchers said their findings confirm results of past research which had also found that the primary enzyme for metabolizing ethanol — found in alcoholic beverages — is relatively inefficient in orangutans and other non-human primates. The researchers believe that the African apes' ability to metabolize ethanol may let them safely consume a whopping 10 pounds of fruit each day. That level of intake suggests exposure to ethanol could be a significant component of chimpanzee life, and a major force of human evolution. Humans may have retained the social aspects that apes bring to scrumping, Catherine Hobaiter, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at St Andrews, said. "A fundamental feature of our relationship with alcohol is our tendency to drink together, whether a pint with friends or a large social feast," she added. "The next step is to investigate how shared feeding on fermented fruits might also influence social relationships in other apes."
Daily Mail
5 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
FDA escalates butter recall over undeclared allergen
By The FDA has escalated its warning over a major butter recall that was triggered by a labeling issue. Bunge North America recalled 64,800 lbs of its Non-Hydrogenated European Style Butter Blend last month after investigators found the label did not include milk in the ingredient list. But now the FDA has upgraded the alert to Class II, used when officials fear temporary or medically reversible health effects. Up to 50million Americans are lactose intolerant, estimates suggest, while 6.1million have an allergy to milk. A milk allergy can result in hives, a rash, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, trouble breathing or a life-threatening reaction called anaphylaxis. The butters were distributed to restaurants and bakeries across the US and the Dominican Republic. They were not sold in grocery stores. The recall included 1,800 cases of 36-count 1lbs butter blocks. A total of 64,800 blocks of the butter have been recalled. The FDA said butters in the recall had a product code found on their packaging that reads: 5064036503. It has not been revealed whether there are any reports of adverse reactions as a result of consuming the butter. Businesses that received the butter were warned over the labeling issue via email, letter, telephone call or a visit . Estimates suggest about 30 to 50million Americans suffer from lactose intolerance, leaving them unable to eat foods such as butter. The condition is caused by the small intestine no longer making the enzyme lactase, which is used to break down the sugar lactose found in milk-containing foods. It can cause stomach upset and bloating but it is not a life threatening allergy. It more commonly affects African or Hispanic Americans and people who have taken antibiotics or chemotherapy drugs. Doctors say the condition usually can't be reversed, and people are advised to manage it by following a low-lactose diet. This is done by limiting consumption of any lactose-containing foods, such as cakes, cookie dough and milk chocolate. People with a milk allergy, however, can suffer more severe symptoms within minutes of consuming cow's milk. It is caused by the immune system attacking a protein found in the milk. Those who suffer from the reaction can be treated with antihistamines or epinephrine to reduce the reaction.
