Patients with low back pain had distinct clinical course patterns that were typically neither complete recovery nor constant pain. A latent class analysis of longitudinal data

The clinical course of LBP is complex. Most primary care patients do not become pain-free within a year, but only a small proportion reports constant severe pain. Some distinct patterns exist which were identified independently of the way the outcome was modeled. These patterns would not be revealed by using the simple summary measures traditionally applied in LBP research or when describing a patient's pain history only in terms of duration. The appropriate number of subgroups will depend on the intended purpose of subgrouping.