Engagement in an mHealth guided exercise therapy program is associated with reductions in chronic musculoskeletal pain.

Abstract

Chronic musculoskeletal (MSK) pain costs the US $980 billion annually. Conservative treatments are the gold standard, but scalable methods of treatment remain to be evaluated. To determine the effects of pain reduction and the perceived benefits of an mHealth exercise therapy program. This is a retrospective observational study on data from 3109 people, (18-98, 49% female) with MSK pain in an mHealth exercise program. Pre-session pain was measured via 11-point NRS and non-standardized single-item questions for work and quality of Life (QoL); all were analyzed using mixed-effects models. By 11 sessions, there was an estimated a 2.09-point decrease in average NRS pain levels. There was an average percent increase of ~0.7-points for Work-Life and QoL (t????=6,632 = 12.06; p < 0.001). User engagement was high; 46% of participants were performing more than one session per day, and 88% were engaging within a week, indicating the feasibility of the deployment of an mHealth exercise app. An mHealth exercise program was associated with significant decrease in pain and increased perceived benefits in a large population. These findings serve as preliminary findings of the feasibility for mHealth exercise interventions as scalable tools to improve chronic MSK pain outcomes.