Lower back pain strikes about 80 percent of Americans over the age of 50, making it a nearly university rite of passage after middle age.

But while billions of dollars are spent each year on painkillers, surgery, and other therapies, new research suggests the best fix for back pain may actually be found at the gym.

A growing body of sports science studies finds that the right types of exercise can ease back pain and may even prevent it, The New York Times reports.

Back pain develops for many reasons, including lifestyle, genetics, ergonomics, sports injuries, snow shoveling, or accidents.

But according to a comprehensive new scientific review of back pain prevention, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, researchers affiliated with the George Institute for Global Health at the University of Sydney in Australia and other institutions examined more than 6,000 studies about back-pain prevention and found exercise programs proved to be potent preventatives.

In fact, “the size of the protective effect” from exercise “was quite large,” said Chris Maher, a professor at the George Institute, who oversaw the new review. “Exercise combined with education reduced the risk of an episode of low back pain in the next year by 45 percent. In other words, it almost halved the risk.”

In general, regular exercises that combine aerobic conditioning with strength and balance training were most effective in easing or preventing back pain.