Don’t want chronic pain? Then get more active.
Want to avoid severe chronic pain down the road? Then pick up your physical activity.
In 2023, researchers from The Arctic University of Norway, the University Hospital of North Norway, and the Norwegian Institute of Public Health discovered that among more than 10,000 adults, those who were physically active had a higher pain tolerance than did sedentary individuals.
Moreover, the higher the activity level, the higher the pain tolerance.
Following this finding, the researchers sought to understand how physical activity could influence the likelihood of experiencing chronic pain several years later, speculating that this might be related to physical activity’s effect on pain tolerance.
Anders Årnes, on of the study authors, noted in the paper that the research found that those who were more active during their free time had a smaller chance of experiencing different types of chronic pain seven to eight years out.
An example he cited was that being just a bit more active, such as walking your dog briskly instead of at a medium or moderate pace, was associated with a 5% reduced risk of having some type of chronic pain later on.
He also notes in the paper that higher activity was associated with a 16% lower risk of severe chronic pain in various body locations.
How was the research done?
The researchers measured cold pain tolerance to explore this relationship.
They found that the ability to tolerate pain contributed to the protective effect of physical activity, suggesting that increased pain tolerance might be one mechanism through which activity reduces the risk of severe chronic pain.
The study included nearly 7,000 participants from the Tromsø survey, a long-term health and lifestyle data collection initiative.
After collecting information on participants’ exercise habits, the researchers assessed their cold pain tolerance in a laboratory.
Later, they checked if participants experienced chronic pain lasting three months or more, including pain in multiple body parts or severe pain.
Among the participants, 60% reported some form of chronic pain, with only 5% experiencing severe pain in multiple body parts.
The findings were published in Journal of the International Association for the Study of Pain.
The paper points out that those with chronic pain can clearly benefit from a customized exercise regimen.
This research underscores the importance of physical activity in increasing pain tolerance and potentially reducing the risk of chronic pain.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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