A recent study has found that physical therapy brings in limited benefit in low back pain conditions in comparison to usual care. It states that the patients who received physical therapy experienced minor improvement in their functions such as walking and moving and lifting weight at the end of three months from the commencement of the treatment. Doctors have a lot of ways to treat back pain, including medications, physical therapy, chiropractic manipulation, injections and surgery. One hundred eight participants underwent four physical therapy sessions in the early physical therapy group, while 112 had usual care, which involved no additional interventions during the first four weeks.
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And, the participants reported no improvement in pain after one month, three months or one year of therapy, the researchers said.
Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the research addressed the problem of chronic back pain and the various factors that influence it; medical, psychological, and social. Using analysis of covariance, early physical therapy showed improvement relative to usual care in disability after 3 months (mean ODI score: early physical therapy group, 41.3 [95% CI, 38.7 to 44.0] at baseline to 6.6 [95% CI, 4.7 to 8.5] at 3 months; usual care group, 40.9 [95% CI, 38.6 to 43.1] at baseline to 9.8 [95% CI, 7.9 to 11.7] at 3 months; between-group difference, -3.2 [95% CI, -5.9 to -0.47], P =.02).
The previous study, conducted in England, found that while patients who only went through talking therapy felt they would have benefited from physical therapy as well, the researchers did not find a significant difference between groups of patients that had and had not received it.
Fritz is a professor in the department of physical therapy and the associate dean for research in the College of Health at the University of Utah.
After a period of one year the researchers found no significant difference between the two groups.
It can be useful for someone who needs assistance starting to exercise or staying active while recovering from back pain, Fritz said.
The researchers said patients simply understanding they are being helped can have an effect on the pain patients feel. If someone is beginning to exercise, physical therapy may accelerate the process somewhat and make the whole experience a bit easier.
What is challenging in managing lower back pain however is that there are patients who may re-exacerbate their back pain just when they thought the symptom has passed.
“If you’d rather try that than drugs or anything else, it’s certainly worth a try”, Delitto said. “That’s counter to what we were telling people 20 years ago”.
However, patients shouldn’t go to physical therapy expecting a cure-all, Delitto added.
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For more on low back pain, visit the U.S. National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.
