If you suffer from acute low back pain, your best remedy may be to stay active. Researchers at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, examined 109 patients with acute severe low back pain and advised them to 1) stay active even though it hurts, or 2) adjust their activity to the pain. They also were asked to keep a diary for seven days to note to what extent they could carry out daily activities and how they felt physically. In spite of experiencing more pain, the group that was asked to be as active as possible recovered more quickly. The other subjects, who had been advised to adjust their activity to their pain, were less mobile and felt slightly depressed.
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