The Comparison of the Effect of Thoracic Flexibility Exercise and Lumbar Stabilization Exercise on Pain and Heart Rate Variability of Patients with Chronic Low Back Pain

To compare the effects of the Thoracic Flexibility Exercise (TFE) with those of Lumbar Stabilization Exercise (LSE) in patients with chronic low back pain. Participants were randomly assigned to TFE (n=11) or LSE (n=11) groups. Chronic low back pain patients in both groups underwent standard physiotherapy for 35 minutes per session. Additionally, TFE and LSE exercises were performed 3 times per week for 4 weeks. The visual analog scale, autonomic nerve activity, and standard deviation normal to normal were measured after 4 weeks of training. After 4 weeks of training, the visual analog scale, autonomic nerve activity, and standard deviation normal to normal improved significantly in both groups after the intervention compared to the baseline (p<0.05). Further, the visual analog scale, autonomic nerve activity, and standard deviation normal to normal improved more significantly in the TFE group than in the LSE group (p<0.05). This study demonstrates that TFE and LSE are both beneficial for improving pain and heart rate variability. However, TFE was superior to SLE in improving the visual analog scale, autonomic nerve activity, and standard deviation from normal to normal.