Massage therapy for acute low back pain

Date First Published:

July 20, 2005

Last Updated:

July 20, 2005

Report by:

Simon Carley, Consultant in Emergency Medicine (Manchester Royal Infirmary)

Search checked by:

Johannes Willem Kleynhans, Manchester Royal Infirmary

Three-Part Question:

[In patients presenting with acute low back pain] is [massage better than simple advice] at [decreasing pain, increading mobility, and speeding a return to work]

Clinical Scenario:

A 55 year old patient presents to her general practitioner with a 5 day history of lower back pain. Heis previously fit and well, has no neurological symptoms or signs or features to suggest a serious underlying cause. You diagnose a simple low back strain and advise him to take keep mobile, take analgesics as required and expect to improve fairly rapidly. He informs you that his brother in law is a massage therapist and wonders if you think it would help him get better quicker.

Search Strategy:

Medline, OVID interface via ATHENS 1966-Feb 2005
Cochrane. Edition 1 2005

Search Details:

Medline
back pain.mp. or exp Back Pain/ or exp Low Back Pain/ or lumbar pain.mp. or exp Back Pain/ and exp MASSAGE/ or massage.mp. limit to humans and english language and abstracts and 2001-2005

Cochrane.
back-pain and massage

Outcome:

Medline. 83 papers. 4 Systematic review since 2001 included in this BET.

Cochrane.
1 relevant systematic review found.

Relevant Paper(s):

Study Title	Patient Group	Study type (level of evidence)	Outcomes	Key results	Study Weaknesses
Massage for low back pain. Furlan AD, Brossseau L, Imamura M, Irvin E. 2002 Not stated	Randomised or Quasi randomised studies investigating the use of any massage (hands or mechanical device) as a treatment for non-specific back pain. Extensive search along Cochrane guidelines.	Systematic review and meta-analysis	Number of papers found	9 publications included in study	Only one of the trials had an effective non-intervention (sham) control group. All studies included in the paper had participants with back pain lasting more than 6 weeks, often much longer making the results difficult to extrapolate to the acute setting.
			Quality of papers (according to Cochrane back pain study group criteria)	5 had high quality scores. 3 had low quality scores.
			Massage vs. sham Laser	One study. Massage better than sham therapy at long and short term function, short term pain, but not on quality of pain. Only 51 patients in trial.
			Massage vs. spinal manipulation	4 studies. 3 showed manipulation better than massage in early stages. Limited evidence to suggest that at 3 weeks little difference in outcomes.
			Massage vs. electrical stimulation	3 studies. No difference found.
			Massage vs. Corset	2 studies. No differences found
			Massage vs. exercise,	1 study. Massage better at short term function. No difference at long term. No differene in pain intensity, ROM, pain quality at short or long term.
			Massage vs relaxation therapy	1 study. No significant difference.
			Massage vs. acupuncture	1 study. Massage better in terms of function at 10 and function and symptoms at 52 weeks.
			Massage vs. self care education	1 study. Massage better at 10 weeks (SMD -2.79 CI -3.22 to -2.36) and 52 weeks (-1.49 (-1.84 to -1.15) for pain intensity and symptom botherness.Better for function at 10 weeks SMD -1.8 (CI -4.31 to -3.29) but not at 52 weeks SMD 0.57 (0.26 to 0.88)
			Massage as component of combined therapy	1 study. Massage more effective if combined with an exercise program.
A review of the evidence for the effectiveness, safety, and cost of acupuncture, massage therapy, and spinal manipulation for back pain. Cherkin,D.C.; Sherman,K.J.; Deyo,R.A.; Shekelle,P.G. 2003 USA	A review of systematic reviews of RCTs published since 1995 evaluating massage, acupuncture, spinal manipulationfor non-specific back pain. The authors also looked for any papers puiblished since the publication of any systematic reviews.	Narrative review of systematic reviews and subsequent relevant controlled trials.	Papers found	2 systematic review. 3 subsequent controlled trials.	Search strategy limited to time after 1995
			Quality of included studies	Not explicit.
			Effectiveness of massage therapy	Massage appears to have some beneficial effect that may last up to 52 weeks. Recent higher quality studies suggest greater benefit to massage.
Manual therapies for pain control: Chiropractic and Massage Ernst E 2004 England	Papers were sought if they were either chiropractic or massage therapy systematic reviews. Data sources from electronic databases, references and authors personal files.	Review article of previously published systematic reviews.	Number of papers found	6 papers. Only 2 related to massage therapy	Both of the massage papers included in the review were written by the author of this review! No mention of the widely known Cochrane review published 2 years earlier. Inclusion criteria for studies not explicit. No explicit quality score for studies.
			Quality of studies	Not explicit
			Systematic reviews of low back pain and massage	1 study that included 6 primary studies. Benefit of massage unproven. (this review was also written by Ernst)

Author Commentary:

Although the table reveals three studies examining back pain, they are all limited to the analysis of papers examining massage in the treatment of subacute and chronic back pain. Whilst there appears to be some evidence in those settings it is not acceptable to extrapolate data from the long term settings to the acute phase.

Bottom Line:

There is lack of published evidence for or against the use of massage in the treatment of acute simple low back pain.

Level of Evidence:

Level 2: Studies considered were neither 1 or 3

References:

Furlan AD, Brossseau L, Imamura M, Irvin E.. Massage for low back pain.
Cherkin,D.C.; Sherman,K.J.; Deyo,R.A.; Shekelle,P.G.. A review of the evidence for the effectiveness, safety, and cost of acupuncture, massage therapy, and spinal manipulation for back pain.
Ernst E. Manual therapies for pain control: Chiropractic and Massage