Neck Solutions

Manual therapy versus electrical stimulation for neck pain

July 16, 2008 on 3:53 pm | In Neck Pain |

Randomised Clinical Trial for Primary Care Patients With Neck Pain: Manual Therapy Versus Electrical Stimulation

From: Atencion Primaria. 2008 Jul 1;40(7):337-343. [Article in Spanish]

To compare the effectiveness of manual therapy versus transcutaneous electrical nervous stimulation (TENS) in reducing the intensity of pain in patients with subacute or chronic neck pain attended at primary care physiotherapy units. Randomised clinical trial. Thirteen primary care physiotherapy units in 4 health districts of the Community of Madrid, Spain. Ninety patients with subacute or chronic neck pain attended. At random, 47 patients were allocated to manual therapy treatment and 43 to TENS. Social and demographic characteristics and prognosis variables in the intervention groups were measured. Intensity of neck pain before and after intervention was calculated by mean values on the analogue visual scale (present moment, average and worst pain of the last 2 weeks). Side-effects were also measured.

Difference between before-and-after pain was 21.83 mm for the group treated with Transcutaneous electrical nervous stimulation and 22.87 mm for manual therapy. The difference in averages on comparing the 2 procedures for improvement was 1.04. TENS and manual therapy significantly reduce patients’ perceived intensity of neck pain, although there were no differences between the 2 groups.There are no conclusive results for the alternative physiotherapy treatments that determine a clear strategy of intervention for neck pain.