{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,30]],"date-time":"2026-09-30T09:08:02Z","timestamp":1790759282838,"version":"4.1.0"},"update-to":[{"DOI":"10.12688\/f1000research.146596.1","type":"new_version","label":"New version","source":"publisher","updated":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,15]],"date-time":"2026-09-15T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1789430400000}}],"reference-count":17,"publisher":"F1000 Research Ltd","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,15]],"date-time":"2026-09-15T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1789430400000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["f1000research.com"],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["F1000Res"],"abstract":"<ns3:p>Background Low Back Pain (LBP) is the most common musculoskeletal disorder in the world. Medical students, particularly those who use computers for study purposes, are more vulnerable to LBP due to prolonged sitting times and improper sitting posture during lectures. However, prior research showed that the prevalence of LBP among medical students appeared lower when they were enrolled during online pandemic learning. Hence, this research is performed to determine the correlation between the duration of sitting and sitting posture on the incidence of LBP among medical students in Universitas Sumatera Utara, Indonesia. Methods A cross-sectional study with an analytical descriptive design was conducted in September 2023 among randomly selected 147 medical students at Universitas Sumatera Utara, Indonesia. The inclusion criteria of the research sample are students with BMI&lt; 23 kg\/m2 while the exclusion criteria are students who have abnormalities and a history of trauma or spinal fractures. Data was obtained from filling out questionnaires of The Pain and Distress Scale (PAD) and Body Awareness of Postural Habit in Young People (BAPHY). A Chi-square test and logistic regression were used to analyze data with a p-value &lt; 0.05 was regarded as statistically significant. Results The study\u2019s findings revealed that 40.1% of students reported having LBP problems, 72.1% reported sitting for more than seven hours each day, and 33.3% reported having a bad sitting posture. Chi-square analysis revealed a significant correlation between sitting duration and posture on complaints of lower back pain (RR = 1.69, p = 0.041 and RR = 1.69, p = 0.009). At a risk of 2,438 times, sitting posture is the main factor contributing to LBP among medical students at Universitas Sumatera Utara, Indonesia. Conclusions This research showed a significant correlation between duration and sitting posture on the incidence of low back pain.<\/ns3:p>","DOI":"10.12688\/f1000research.146596.2","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,15]],"date-time":"2026-09-15T08:19:32Z","timestamp":1789460372000},"page":"1379","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.12688\/f1000research.crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Correlation of Prolonged Sitting Time and Sitting Posture on Low Back Pain: A Cross-Sectional Study among Medical Students at Universitas Sumatera Utara"],"prefix":"10.12688","volume":"13","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0003-4813-3371","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jocelyn","family":"Koswara","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Medical Study Program, Faculty of Medicine Medan North Sumatra 20155 Universitas Sumatera Utara"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Yetty","family":"Machrina","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine Medan North Sumatra 20155 Universitas Sumatera Utara"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Mahrani","family":"Lubis","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine Medan North Sumatra 20155 Universitas Sumatera Utara"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0419-9622","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Rina","family":"Amelia","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine Medan North Sumatra 20155 Universitas Sumatera Utara"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"2560","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,15]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref1","first-page":"21-26","article-title":"Keluhan Nyeri Punggung Bawah Pada Nelayan.","volume":"2","author":"N Kumbea","year":"2021","journal-title":"Indonesian J. 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I sincerely appreciate your feedback and suggestions, which have helped improve the quality and clarity of our study.  I acknowledge the typing error in the manuscript where the term \u201cchildren\u201d was mistakenly written instead of \u201cstudents\/ participants.\u201d I appreciate your careful observation regarding this issue, and the error will be corrected accordingly in the revised version of the manuscript. I would also like to clarify that the sample size calculation in this study was determined using the cross-sectional study sample size formula.  In addition, I have added the strengths and limitations of the study in the discussion section. The strengths of this study include the use of validated and reliable questionnaires, namely The Pain and Distress Scale (PAD) and Body Awareness of Postural Habits in Young People (BAPHY), as well as the use of simple random sampling to minimize selection bias and improve sample representativeness. Furthermore, the study focused on a relatively homogeneous population and controlled several confounding factors through strict inclusion and exclusion criteria.  However, I also acknowledge several limitations, including the cross-sectional design, which cannot establish causality, the use of self-reported online questionnaires that may introduce recall and response bias, and the limited generalizability of the findings, as the study was conducted in a single institution and one academic batch only due to the limited time available. I greatly appreciate the reviewer\u2019s insightful feedback, which has helped improve the quality of our manuscript.","URL":"https:\/\/f1000research.com\/articles\/13-1379\/v2#referee-comment-16205","order":2,"name":"referee-comment-16205","label":"Referee Comment","group":{"name":"article-reports","label":"Article Reports"}},{"value":"The author(s) declared that no grants were involved in supporting this work","order":3,"name":"grant-information","label":"Grant Information"},{"value":"This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.","order":0,"name":"copyright-info","label":"Copyright"}]}}