A study to assess the effectiveness of stretching exercises on joint pain among obese women in selected areas at Puducherry

Background: Pain is an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage. Pain is an abstract concept which refers to a personal, private, and sensation of hurt, a harmful stimulus with signal current or pattern of responses. A person in pain feels distress or suffering and seeks relief. Pain is much more than a physical sensation caused by specific stimulus. Objectives: (1) To assess the pre-test and post-test level of joint pain among obese women in both control group and experimental group.(2) To evaluate the effectiveness of stretching exercise to reduce joint pain among obese women in experimental group and compare with control group.(3) To find the association between post-test level of joint pain among obese women with selected demographic variables. Methodology: A Total 50 obese women were selected by using simple random sampling technique and true experimental (one group pretest and posttest control group design) was adopted for the study. The data collection was divided into two sections in which section (a) contains socio demographic variables and section (b) contains Lysholm knee scoring scale. Pretest was conducted in both control group and experimental group by using perceived Lysholm knee scoring scale. Stretching exercise intervention was given to experimental group for 10 minutes twice in a day for 6 days. And post test was conducted in both control group and experimental group using perceived Lysholm knee scoring scale. Data analysis was done using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results: The study findings revealed that, posttest of true experimental group mean score was 14,500 with standard deviation 4.88284 was higher when compared to pretest mean score of 23.2000 with the standard deviation 5.69025 and it was statistically significant at the value of p<0.0001 and the posttest level of Lysholm knee scoring scale was associated with history of joint pain and it was significant at the level of p<0.001. The study concluded that stretching exercise was effective to reduce the joint pain among obese women in experimental group when compared to control group. Conclusion: The study concludes that stretching exercise was effective and helped to reduce the level of joint pain among the obese women.