We won!

As many of you may know, I recently worked on a study about Pregnancy-related Pelvic Girdle Pain (PPGP) with two colleagues, Alex Frankham, a physiotherapist based in Jersey, and Dr Sinéad Dufour, at McMaster University in Canada. We looked into perceptions of the causes and treatment of PPGP among physiotherapists based in the UK, using an online survey. It was a larger form or a previous study we did in Ireland, and produced similar results, with a few differences.

In the past the prevailing view of PPGP among experts has been that it has mechanical causes – things like pelvic instability, back pain or lack of core strength, or a high BMI. But some experts think the causes may be psychological – like fear or emotional stress - or physiological, like an imbalance of the autonomic nervous system.

All this, as you know, closely relates to my work. My colleagues and I wanted to find out what chartered physiotherapists thought of the issue, as this would tell us how they would be most likely to assess and treat patients.

Our results from just over 100 physiotherapists told us that they considered both mechanical and psychological factors to be causes of PPGP. They also selected both mechanical and psychological treatment options, although the latter (including explaining pain, addressing fear, and lifestyle factors) were the most popular options.

We presented our results to the Journal of Pelvic, Obstetric and Genealogical Physiotherapy’s 2022 research competition, and I’m thrilled to say we won! We were invited to present our work at the POGP virtual study day at the beginning of November. It was a great opportunity to discuss our findings, and also a wonderful reward after a lot of hard work!

If you’d like to see the poster, you can find it on the research page of the website or by clicking here.