Chronic neck pain is a major and serious health problem worldwide. Neck pain is often accompanied with restricted neck movement, dizziness, anxiety, and insomnia. Acupuncture is an effective treatment for chronic neck pain.
A review summarises the most current scientific evidence on the effectiveness of acupuncture for acute, subacute and chronic neck pain from 27 studies. Of the 27 included studies, three represented individuals with whiplash-associated disorders (WADs) ranging from acute to chronic (205 participants), five explored chronic myofascial neck pain (186 participants), five chronic pain due to arthritic changes (542 participants), six chronic non-specific neck pain (4011 participants), two neck pain with radicular signs (43 participants) and six subacute or chronic mechanical neck pain (5111 participants).
They found that acupuncture is beneficial at immediate-term follow-up compared with sham acupuncture for pain intensity; at short-term follow-up compared with sham or inactive treatment for pain intensity; at short-term follow-up compared with sham treatment for disability; and at short-term follow-up compared with wait-list control for pain intensity and neck disability improvement. Their result has shown that acupuncture relieves pain effectively compared to the controls.
A random controlled clinical trial in Norway was performed. In this trial Twenty-four female office workers (age 47 +/- 9 years old) who had had neck and shoulder pain for 12 +/- 9 years, were randomly assigned to a test group or a control group. Acupuncture was applied 10 times during three to four weeks. Result has shown that pain-related activity impairment at work was significantly less in the test group than the controls by the end of treatment. Also there were significant differences between the groups for quality of sleep, anxiety, depression and satisfaction with life. At six months and three years follow ups the acupuncture group showed further improvements in most variables and was again significantly different from the control group. Conclusion from this trial: Intensive acupuncture treatment may improve activity at work and several relevant social and psychological variables for women with chronic pain in the neck and shoulders. The effect may last for at least three years.
References
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Trinh K, et al Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2016:CD004870.
