The Impact of Functional Movement Patterns and Body Armor Use on Pain: A Secondary Analysis
Abstract
Pain is a common complaint among returning military personnel (Konitzer, Fargo, Brininger, and Lim Reed, 2008; Roy, Lopez, and Piva, 2013). Pain, both acute and chronic, is a common consequence of non-battle injuries, leading to pain complaints years after military service (Haskell et al., 2012). The purpose of this study was to explore the relationships between functional movement patterns, wearing body armor, and postdeployment pain. A secondary analysis was conducted on two subsets of data (n = 398) provided by a large, prospective, 3 year, Office of Naval Research-funded investigation of injury outcomes in deployed US Marines (Primary Investigator: Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Beutler). The parent study gathered measures of functional movement status, health behaviors, and previous injuries throughout a combat deployment cycle. The research question, subjects with lower functional movement patterns and higher weekly body armor use scores report higher pain levels after a combat deployment, was validated. The findings of this research of a US Marine sample demonstrated that a US Marine sample with low Functional Movement Screen (FMS) scores and higher weekly body armor use reported higher pain severity than high functional movement groups with lower weekly body armor use rates, with significant p values between 0.001 and 0.048. Mean pain severity was significantly higher for low FMS performers (FMS 14) compared to high FMS performers (FMS > 15 points): Low FMS: 3.1 2.4 vs. Hi FMS: 1.5 2.1; t129 = 4.62; p < 0.001. In addition, the correlation between weekly time wearing body armor and pain severity score was significant and positively related (r = 0.24; p = 0.003).
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2014
- Accession Number
- AD1127754
Entities
People
- Carl Goforth
Organizations
- Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences