Source: DGNews  |  Posted 2 years ago

By Kristina Rebelo

SAN DIEGO -- May 12, 2009-- For adolescents with a diagnosis of juvenile primary fibromyalgia syndrome (JPFS), new findings suggest that there are differences between the most and least active groups with the highly active group exhibiting greater overall functioning within the parameters of their illness, according to a study presented here at the 28th Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Pain Society (APS).

Adolescents with JPFS self-reported difficulties in numerous areas of functioning, including psychiatric symptoms, depression, and decreased participation in physical activities. Actigraphy-based monitoring was also utilised to measure rest/activity cycles, a sensor worn by the patient on the wrist with data sent to a computer for analysis.

Researchers sought to describe the percentage of time spent in sedentary, light, moderate, and vigourous physical activities and to then explore whether age, pain intensity, functional disability or depressive symptoms were associated with vigourous activity levels.

"Basically, what we expected to find was that physical activity was related to pain rating, depression, and functional disability," said lead author Stacy R. Flowers, Behavioral Medicine and Clinical Psychology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, Ohio, on May 7.

"And when we looked at the overall sample, we found a lot of variability between the active and nonactive kids."

There were 104 adolescents aged 11 to 18 years (mean age, 14.9 years) with a diagnosis of JPFS; 93 were female and 11 were male. Physical activity, pain, functional impairment, and depressive symptoms were measured.

Study results stated that the average pain rating was 5.3 (standard deviation = 1.87) on a Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) of 0 to 10. The study population spent the majority of time -- measured in minutes -- in sedentary activity (907) followed by light (295), moderate (140), and vigourous (58) activity.

The average activity count during daytime hours (6:00 AM-10:00 PM) was 73.4 per minute. There were no significant differences in vigourous physical activity among adolescents who were depressed and those who were not (P > .05).

The vigourous physical activity data were divided into quartiles so differences between the 26 most active (Q1) and the 26 least-active adolescents (Q4) could be compared.

The study found that high-active adolescents were younger than low-active adolescents (P = .005), and reported lower average pain, rating pain than low-active adolescents (P = .025). Low-active adolescents had higher mean depression scores and higher mean functional disability scores than high-active adolescents.

It was hypothesised by study authors that differences may have been more prominent in a larger sample.

Flowers said that the least-active adolescent spent 20 hours per day sedentary and the most active spent 225 minutes per day in vigorous activity.

"What we found was that higher activity had less pain intensity, lower depression, and lower functional impairment," she said.

Future directions for this study may include looking to see if increased physical activity levels are related to better long-term outcomes. "Perhaps, also in the future, we will have physicians prescribing physical activity for JPFS," said Flowers.

[Presentation title: Physical Activity Monitoring in Children and Adolescents With Juvenile Primary Fibromyalgia Syndrome. Abstract 265.]