Long-term home-based physical exercise, pain, and use of pain medication over a year after hip fracture - A secondary analysis of a randomised controlled trial.

This is a secondary analysis of a trial originally designed to measure days lived at home, not pain outcomes. Pain intensity and interference were assessed as global measures, not specific to the hip, which may have diluted the effect on hip-specific pain. Information on pain medication use before the fracture and previous pain history was not collected. Assessors were not blinded to group allocation, which could introduce bias in self-reported outcomes.

The study was funded by the South Karelia Social and Health Care District, the Social Insurance Institution of Finland, and State Research Funding for Academic Health Research. The funders had no role in the study design, data analysis, or manuscript preparation. The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest.

Do not assume that home-based exercise will reduce the amount of pain medication your patients need or lower their reported pain intensity scores. The trial found no difference between the exercise and usual care groups for these specific outcomes, even though hip pain prevalence and pain interference improved.