For chronic low back pain, the guideline advice is to stay active and exercise, but there are many exercise types to choose from. This overview gathered together the existing systematic reviews to compare them, including motor control exercise, which focuses on retraining the deep trunk muscles that support the spine.
By reviewing many reviews at once, the authors aimed to give a broad, high-level picture of how different exercise types perform for pain and function in chronic low back pain.
Motor control, or core stability, exercise is widely used for low back pain. Understanding how it compares with other exercise types helps clinicians choose and explain the right approach.
Programmes that retrain the timing and control of the deep trunk and spinal muscles, often starting with gentle, specific activation before progressing.
Comparisons across aerobic training, resistance training, Pilates, aquatic exercise and more, so no single type was viewed in isolation.
Motor control exercise performed well, though it was not uniquely superior.
Motor control exercise was associated with reduced pain in chronic low back pain across the reviewed evidence.
It also improved function and disability, helping people move more comfortably in daily life.
Motor control exercise was broadly comparable to other effective exercise types rather than clearly better than all of them.
The consistent theme was that exercising and staying active helps, more than the specific type chosen.
Motor control exercise reduces pain and improves function in chronic low back pain, performing comparably to other effective exercise types, which reinforces that staying active matters more than any single exercise style.
This supports using motor control and core-focused exercise as one good option within a low back pain plan, while freeing clinicians to match the exercise type to the individual rather than insisting on one approach.
It pairs well with hands-on treatment: manual therapy to ease symptoms and improve comfort, and progressive exercise, including motor control work where suitable, to build lasting capacity.
Supports motor control exercise as one effective, evidence-based option within individualised low back pain rehabilitation.
Reinforces combining hands-on treatment with core and trunk exercise tailored to the person.
Backs using massage to support comfort and activity while guiding clients toward exercise for lasting change.
Relevant for helping active clients build trunk control and strength as part of return to sport and training.
This was an overview of reviews, so it inherits the varying quality of the underlying studies, and exercise trials are hard to blind. Motor control exercise was not shown to be clearly superior to other types, so it should be offered as one good option, not the only one.
The practical, well-supported message is that exercising helps and the type can be tailored to the person. Please confirm the citation details and author list against the source before publishing.
This review of reviews found that motor control exercise reduces pain and improves function in chronic low back pain, performing comparably to other effective exercise types.
For myotherapists, physiotherapists and remedial massage therapists, it supports offering motor control exercise as one good option within an active, individualised low back pain plan.
Summarizing the Effects of Different Exercise Types in Chronic Low Back Pain: A Systematic Review of Systematic Reviews. Grooten WJA, Boström C, Dedering Å, and colleagues. BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, 2022; 23(1): 801.
