investigating the relationship between the praying and back pain in commercial drivers

background low back pain (lbp) is the most common and multifactor problem among the commercial drivers and the individual, social, psychological and occupational factors have important role in intensifying this pain. in various studies, the role of spiritual factor was investigated less compared to other factors. objectives the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of religious belief and praying on lbp among the commercial drivers. patients and methods in this cross sectional study, commercial drivers in karaj, iran were studied during fall and winter 2010-2011. the variables include demographic data, years of commercial driving, chronic back pain (suffering from back pain for more than three months), pain intensity, job status and the religious belief and behavior. the tools of data collection were medical history, the researcher-made questionnaire about the religious belief, praying and visual analogue scale (vas) with a numerical range of 1-10 for intensifying the lbp. data were compared by chi-square 2 and student t and regression tests. results two hundred and forty two drivers with the mean age of 34.30 ± 5.21 investigated and 67 of them (27.68%) had chronic back pain. forty two of them were truck man. the mean of pain severity for the back pain suffered drivers was 5.36 ± 1.11. the relationship between lbp occurrence and smoking, job group and positive attitude to role of praying in health was not significant. the difference of mean age and the job record in the drivers without back pain was significant. also the outbreak of back pain in drivers who pray was less than the others and the lbp intensity in patients who pray consistently was less statistically. conclusions praying plays an important role in decreasing lbp. it is recommended to consider the spiritual and religious issues along with regarding the improvement of healthy life style between the work forces and assessment of ergonomic problems.