[Acupuncture (dry needle) versus neural therapy (local anesthesia) in the treatment of benign back pain. Immediate and long-term results].
OBJECTIVE
A retrospective study of benign low back pain, comparing the early and long-term results obtained by means of acupuncture and Huneke's neural-therapy is presented.


METHODS
Two groups, (dry needling group and neural-therapy group) consisting of 104 and 152 patients respectively, were compared for age, pain duration, treatment length, number of sessions and initial intensity of the pain.


RESULTS
The age and pain duration resulted significantly higher in the neural-therapy group; the percentage of subjective improvement proved to be greater for neural-therapy, even if not in a statistically significant manner, both immediately after therapy (70.4% and 74.8%) and at all the time intervals studied (every 3 months until 4 years, when possible). Similar results have been obtained both in acute cases (pain duration shorter than 6 weeks) and in chronic ones (pain lasting at least 6 months).


CONCLUSIONS
In conclusion, this study shows a slight, but not statistically significant, preference for neural-therapy, subjectively considered by the patient more effective than acupuncture in 49 out of 51 comparisons carried out.
Barbagli
P
P
Dipartimento di Farmacologia e Anestesiologia, Università degli Studi di Padova, Padova. paolo.barbagli@tin.it
Bollettin
R
R
Ceccherelli
F
F
D015670:Acupuncture Therapy; D000368:Aged; D000772:Anesthesia, Local; D000779:Anesthetics, Local / Q000008:administration & dosage; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008012:Lidocaine / Q000008:administration & dosage; D017116:Low Back Pain / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000628:therapy*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013997:Time Factors; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D000779:Anesthetics, Local; D008012:Lidocaine