Myofascial Massage in the Treatment of Chronic Low Back Pain

University of Roma La Sapienza

Status: Completed

Conditions: Chronic Low Back Pain

Treatments: Other: Massage therapy; Other: Neurocognitive rehabilitation

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT02646280

3791/2015

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of the study is to determine the effectiveness of an approach that combines massage therapy with elements of neurocognitive rehabilitation such as motor imagery and the words of the physiotherapist compared to a traditional massage therapy in reducing pain in patients with chronic low back pain (CLBP) and to evaluate if and how the pain reduction is linked to the interoceptive awareness and which is the patient's ability to relax through the measurement of the hearth rate variability (HRV).

Enrollment: 51 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 50 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Presence of chronic nonspecific low back pain for at least three months
• Subjects aged between 18 and 50 years

Exclusion criteria

• Presence of acute low back pain
• Low back pain due to other causes (vertebral fractures, spondylolisthesis, herniated discs, lumbar canal stenosis)
• Disorders of central and/or peripheral nervous system
• Systemic inflammatory disease (eg rheumatoid arthritis)
• Systemic infectious disease
• Neoplastic disease
• Previous Surgery
• Cognitive impairment
• Pregnancy

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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51 participants in 2 patient groups

Massage therapy and contact experience

Experimental group

Description:

Traditional massage therapy consisting of different phases: surface touch, deep touch, static pressures, dynamic pressures and kneading associated with a preparation to the contact phase of the massage using the typical elements of neurocognitive rehabilitation such as motor imagery, dynamic state during which a person mentally simulates an action, and language, necessary to understand the way of perceiving and organizing sensory, cognitive and phenomenological informations by the patients and so to interpretate pain in a more articulate way.

Treatment:

Other: Neurocognitive rehabilitation

Other: Massage therapy

Massage therapy

Active Comparator group

Description:

Traditional massage therapy consisting of different phases: surface touch, deep touch, static pressures, dynamic pressures and kneading.

Treatment:

Other: Massage therapy