What's going on
PhysioOnClick assesses and treats back pain by video, or with a home visit in the Glasgow area — everything below is exactly what that assessment covers. Most non-specific low back pain is driven by a mix of mechanical sensitivity, muscle guarding and deconditioning rather than a single damaged structure. Discs, facet joints and the surrounding muscles all share nerve supply, which is why pain can feel deep, diffuse and hard to pin to one spot, and why it often eases and flares in a pattern that doesn't map neatly onto any scan finding.
Pain intensity in the first few days is usually a poor guide to injury severity. NICE guidance on the assessment and management of low back pain and sciatica in adults emphasises that imaging rarely changes management for straightforward presentations, and that staying active — within a tolerable range — tends to outperform prolonged rest.
What physiotherapy assessment looks at
A physiotherapy assessment for back pain covers how symptoms behave over a full day, which movements ease or aggravate them, muscle strength and control through the trunk and hips, and enough neurological screening to rule out nerve involvement before building a loading plan.
Where home-working posture is the main day-to-day problem, assessment also looks specifically at how that symptom behaves — what makes it better or worse, and how it's changed since it started — since that shapes which part of the rehab plan gets priority first.
Practical guidance on home-working posture
Home workstations are frequently improvised — a laptop on a kitchen table, a sofa, or a dining chair — and the resulting posture (neck flexed forward, shoulders hunched, wrists at an awkward angle) tends to load the neck, shoulders and lower back for hours without the variety a traditional office often provided through walking to meetings or a printer.
The most effective, lowest-cost fix is usually raising the laptop screen to eye height (using books or a stand) with a separate keyboard and mouse, rather than working directly on the laptop itself, combined with deliberately building movement breaks back into a day that no longer has an office commute or corridor walks.
When to seek extra help
Call 999 or go to A&E if you have back pain with new bladder or bowel changes (such as difficulty peeing, or peeing or pooing yourself), a loss of feeling around your genitals or anus, pain, tingling, weakness or numbness in both legs, chest pain, or if it started after a serious accident, and do not drive yourself. Leg weakness that is getting worse needs A&E now, or a call to NHS 111 if you are not sure where to go. Unexplained weight loss, fever, or pain that is constant, worsening and unrelated to movement or position falls outside straightforward mechanical back pain and needs same-day medical assessment (an urgent GP appointment or NHS 111) rather than a routine physiotherapy referral.
A practical starting point
Raise your screen so the top of it is roughly at eye level, use a separate keyboard if working from a laptop, and set a alarm for a two-minute stand-and-stretch break at least once an hour through the working day.
This guide is part of PhysioOnClick's patient education library and is intended to support informed decisions, not replace an individual assessment. If symptoms are worsening, unclear, or affecting your confidence with movement, a full physiotherapy assessment is the safest next step.