Low back injury rates have stabilized (Murphy & Volinn, 1999), but the growing economic burden of low back occupational disability (Volinn, Van Koevering & Loeser, 1991) has fuelled an extensive international research effort to identify risk factors for this condition. Over 1000 research and review papers were published in the last decade (Crook et al., 2002). Several empirically-based prediction models have been constructed (Feuerstein & Thebarge, 1991; Frymoyer, 1992; Gatchel, Polatin &Kinney, 1995; Halpern et al., 2001; Hazard et al., 1996; Linton&Hallden, 1997) to parallel theoretical models of occupational musculoskeletal disability (Schultzet al., 2000). At present, however, a limited convergence remains among different empirically-derived models and between empirical and theoretical models.
