Is Dry Needling Effective for Treating Low Back Pain?
One of the most common injuries that sends people to physical therapy is low back pain, and the way we treat this pain has improved substantially over the past several decades. A couple decades ago, if you had low back pain, you would go to your doctor; he would give you some muscle relaxers, maybe tell you to go to physical therapy, and if the pain was bad enough, give you a painkiller (and now we have an opioid epidemic). Now, you can go straight to a physical therapist in most states (including my state: Colorado), rather than going to your doctor first. This has a few advantages. First, the average wait time to see a physician in the US in 24 days, while the wait time to see a physical therapist is much lower. While I can’t find a study examining the US healthcare system to back up this statement, I have never worked in a clinic that couldn’t get a patient in for their first visit within a week of the patient first calling the clinic. Second, physical therapy is substantially less expensive than a visit to your primary care physician; physical therapists are trained to screen patients for conditions that require referral to a physician, but these are extremely rare (<5%). Going to physical therapy first will likely be faster and save you money compared to going to your PCP first.
Is Dry Needling Effective?
With that digression aside, today’s topic is about the effectiveness of dry needling for treating low back pain. Unsurprisingly, the answer is yes (otherwise I probably wouldn’t write a blog post about it). In the best research article to date, a systematic review in 2018 tackled this topic, finding 16 relevant randomized controlled trials that examined the effects of dry needling vs. acupuncture and sham needling on low back pain. This review examined both chronic (>12 weeks) and acute/sub-acute (<12 weeks) low back pain.
When comparing dry needling to sham needling, dry needling was found to improve pain and function to a significantly greater degree than sham needling at short-term follow-up and improved pain at long-term follow-up. The same short-term results were found when dry needling was compared to acupuncture, but long-term results found dry needling and acupuncture to be equally effective for improving pain and function. When dry needling was compared to trigger point injections or laser treatments, the studies returned mixed results. Also of note, dry needling plus acupuncture was more effective than dry needling alone (who would have guessed?).
Summary
While dry needling has excellent results by itself, a good physical therapy will do more than just dry needling for back pain. Most instances of low back pain, especially if there was no traumatic event like falling off a ladder, will have aspects of muscle imbalances (Google “lower crossed syndrome” for an idea of how I view this problem) and neural irritation (check out neurodynamics for more on this), just to name a few. In the hands of a competent therapist, dry needling can be an excellent tool to help treat your back pain and return you to full function.
Western Slope Rehab and Performance is Here to Help
If you are struggling with injuries or have recently been in a motor vehicle accident, we can help. We are a physical therapy company that provides home-based orthopedic services in the Grand Junction, CO, area, as well as telehealth appointments throughout Colorado. If you would like to schedule a free consultation, you can call us as 970-462-9177, or fill out our contact form here.
If you found this post valuable, please like and share on our Facebook page, which is updated regularly with new content.