Effects of Qigong and Exercise Therapy Among Patients With Chronic Neck Pain

A randomized controlled, multicenter trial comparing qigong and exercise therapy concerning pain intensity, treatment expectations, disability, neck movements and quality of life in subjects with non-specific, long-term NP. A comparison will be performed between the two randomized treatment groups in these variables before and after three and 12 months.

Participants were recruited via an advertisement in a local newspaper. Inclusion: Men and women between 18-65 years of age with nonspecific, long term neck pain (<3 months).Exclusion criteria were chronic tension-type headache, migrain, traumatic neck injuries, neurologic signs or symptoms. rheumatic diseases, fibromyalgia or other severe physiologic or physical diserases and difficulties in understand the Swedish language.

The enrollment of participants, the randomization procedure and the performance of measurements were conducted by four independent physiotherapists. Randomization was done in blocks of 30 according to a sealed envelope technique. Assessments were made before treatment (baseline), immediately after treatment and at six and 12-month follow-ups. All participants answered questionnaires about demographic data, pain (duration and intensity) and disability. Pain intensity was rated as current NP and average NP during the week before the assessment, measured with a visual analogue scale (VAS - measured in millimeters with the end points 0 = no pain and 100 = unbearable pain) (Carlsson, 1983). Neck Movements was measured with cervico Thorac Ratio (CTR) (Norlander 2995), Disability was measured with the Neck Disability Index (NDI) (Vernon, 1991), which consists of a ten-item, scaled questionnaire where the total scores are recalculated into percent (0%, no disability; 100%, maximum disability). The items assess NP according to intensity, personal care, lifting, reading, headache, concentration, work, driving, sleeping and recreation. Quality of Life was measured with the SF-36 questionnaire (Sullivan1995).

Study participants One hundred and twenty-two subjects with long-term, non-specific NP were randomized to the interventions of qigong (n=60) and exercise therapy (n=62). Eighty-six (70%) were women and 36 (30%) men, with a mean age of 44 years

The participants were allocated randomly to receive qigong or exercise therapy. In each group, the participants received ten to 12 treatments over a period of three months, and each treatment session lasted one hour. A treatment-specific guideline was developed for each treatment. Treatments were provided by experienced physiotherapists; the physiotherapist responsible for qigong had nothing to do with exercise therapy and vice versa. An attendance list was kept during the intervention period, and all participants were informed that they had to attend at least eight of the 12 sessions to be included for analysis in the study.