To evaluate immediate effects of two different modes of acupuncture on motion-related
pain and cervical spine mobility in chronic
neck pain patients compared to a
sham procedure. Thirty-six patients with chronic
neck pain and limited cervical spine mobility participated in a prospective, randomized, double-blind,
sham-controlled crossover trial. Every patient was treated once with needle acupuncture at distant points,
dry needling (DN) of local myofascial trigger points and
sham laser acupuncture (
Sham). Outcome measures were motion-related
pain intensity (visual analogue scale, 0-100 mm) and range of motion (ROM). In addition, patients scored changes of general complaints using an 11-point verbal rating scale. Patients were assessed immediately before and after each treatment by an independent (blinded) investigator. Multivariate analysis was used to assess the effects of true acupuncture and needle site independently. For motion-related
pain, use of acupuncture at non-local points reduced
pain scores by about a third (11.2 mm; 95% CI 5.7, 16.7; P = 0.00006) compared to DN and
sham. DN led to an estimated reduction in
pain of 1.0 mm (95% CI -4.5, 6.5; P = 0.7). Use of DN slightly improved ROM by 1.7 degrees (95% CI 0.2, 3.2; P = 0.032) with use of non-local points improving ROM by an additional 1.9 degrees (95% CI 0.3, 3.4; P = 0.016). For patient assessment of change, non-local acupuncture was significantly superior both to
Sham (1.7 points; 95% CI 1.0, 2.5; P = 0.0001) and DN (1.5 points; 95% CI 0.4, 2.6; P = 0.008) but there was no difference between DN and
Sham (0.1 point; 95% CI -1.0, 1.2; P = 0.8). Acupuncture is superior to
Sham in improving motion-related
pain and ROM following a single session of treatment in chronic
neck pain patients. Acupuncture at distant points improves ROM more than DN; DN was ineffective for motion-related
pain.