Acupuncture and Alexander technique relieve neck pain
Acupuncture and Alexander technique appear to be equally effective and significantly more effective for the treatment of chronic neck pain than routine care, according to a study by British researchers published in the latest issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.
The doctors divided 517 patients who suffered from neck pain for at least 6 years into three groups. The first group received an average of 10 50-minute acupuncture treatments, the second had an average of 14 30-minute Alexander technique lessons, and the third group received the usual care. The authors found that acupuncture and Alexander technique both led to a significant reduction in neck pain and associated disability compared with usual care at 12 months.
One possible explanation of such good efficacy beyond the direct effect of the treatments was that patients in the active treatment groups had improved self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is the belief that one’s actions are responsible for successful outcomes and it was measured by a standardized questionnaire.
It is possible that other forms of therapy that enhance self-efficacy, such as tai chi, meditation, and other can also improve long-standing neck pain, as well as headaches. There are many acupuncture studies that show a significant benefit for migraine headaches (here is one described in a previous post), however unlike this neck pain study most of them did not follow patients for such a long period of time. Alexander technique has been also helpful for some of my patients, but again, good studies are lacking.
That’s very interesting what you write about self-efficacy. I wasn’t familiar with that term, but it really resonates with me.
I started biofeedback based on how you subjectively rated it in “End of Migraines.” In addition to the direct impact I think the acquisition of a new skill and control over my body has been psychologically gratifying. Realistically I would not have been as inspired to pick up this skill if medical need hadn’t nudged me to.
Incidentally, I feel like self-efficacy gets discouraged by stats that get thrown around without context. While battling chronic migraine I keep seeing a stat that only 25% of people could recover from it. One day I wondered what the context was of that stat and found that it was only over a 2 year period. Furthermore, that is an unconditional stat that doesn’t reflect the type of access to medical care or treatment approach.
I’m reminded of the stat that only 1% of obese people are able to return to a healthy weight. But becoming obese doesn’t foreshadow staying that way. There are diet and nutritional changes that could be adopted.
Similarly, before I learned about biofeedback, physical therapy, CGRP meds, etc, I was being told that “only” 25% of people can get back from chronic migraine. The relevant stat to me would have been what % of people are still intractable after trying all the stuff I was going to try after reading “End of Migraines”
(There was a similar self-efficacy discouraging stat that Neura Health publicized earlier this year. They asserted that “1/3 of people with chronic migraine are able to work full time.”
That stat gives the impression that two thirds of people are unable to work due to chronic migraine. However, the population is over 300+ million and less than 150+ million are employed full-time of the entire population. Most of the two thirds of people in the stat they cited are voluntarily out of the labor force because they would be out of the labor force anyway.
Less than 45% of the entire population work full-time, and we don’t say that “Only 45% of the population are able to work full time.” I worry it has a negative impact on self-efficacy when statistics get thrown around mistakenly without context.)
Thanks for this very informative post about the Alexander Technique. I’ve heard a lot about this method and I’m glad that I came across this article. I’ve learned a lot. In fact, I am currently experiencing headache and lower back pain these past few days. So I think going for Alexander Technique posture classes would be a great idea.