“Limbr, A Novel Personalized Mobile Application For Discogenic Chronic Low Back Pain: A Prospective Pilot Study”

Background: Exercise has showed to reduce pain and improve function in patients with chronic lower back pain (CLBP), however, outcomes have been inconsistent. Limbr is a mobile application (app) developed to increase patient adherence to the exercise program, and enhance exercise’s technique for better results. Methods: : Patients 18 to 65 years of age, with CLBP (more than 3 months) and evidence of lumbar disc pathology by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) were enrolled. Patients’ symptomatology was prospectively evaluated at baseline and during 3 months of using the Limbr app with patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) including: the Visual Analog Scale for pian (VAS), the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), and the Your Activities of Daily Living (YADL) score. Patients’ compliance and satisfaction were evaluated at the end of the follow-up. Results: : Seventy-five patients with CLBP were enrolled in the study. All patients had a significant improvement from baseline to final follow-up in all PROMs. Average VAS scores decreased from 5.17± 2.1 at baseline to 3.8±2.6 at final follow-up (P= 0.016), and ODI scores from 25.7±13.8 to 18.2±13.6 (P= 0.001). Patients showed a significant decrease in the number of pain medications taken during a week (P=0.001). Overall compliance with the app was greater than 52%, with almost 65% of the patients rating the overall experience as good or excellent. Conclusion: Limbr showed to be an effective tool in reducing low back pain symptomatology, as well as generating great compliance to an exercise program for patients with CLBP. Trial registration number: 2/2/2017 NCT03040310 (ClinicalTrials.gov)