Photo Credit: Umang
The following is a summary of “Unhelpful Information About Low Back and Neck Pain on Physiotherapist’s Websites,” published in the January 2025 issue of Pain by Noord et al.
Despite the internet being a primary information source for patients with musculoskeletal pain, the extent to which biopsychosocial, guidelines-consistent, and fear-inducing information on low back pain (LBP) and neck pain (NP) is provided by private physiotherapy practices on the websites remains largely unexplored.
Researchers conducted a retrospective study to analyze the information on private physiotherapy practice websites in the Netherlands about LBP and NP, focusing on guideline consistency, the biopsychosocial model, and the use of fear-inducing language.
They examined the content of all existing private physiotherapy practice websites in the Netherlands through an analysis based on predetermined criteria aligned with the biopsychosocial model and evidence-based guidelines. Descriptive statistics were used for data presentation.
The results showed that after removing duplicates and non-informative sites, 834 (10%) of 8,707 websites remained. Information on LBP was available on 449 (54%) websites, while 295 (35%) provided information on NP. Most websites for both LBP (n = 287, 64%) and NP (n = 174, 59%) were biomedically focused. Treatment advice appeared 1,855 times on 560 (67%) websites, with most interventions not aligned with guidelines and fear-inducing language was used 1,624 (69%) times.
Investigators concluded that most of the information on Dutch private physiotherapy websites regarding LBP and NP was predominantly biomedical, often deviated from current clinical guidelines, and potentially exacerbated patient fear.