The Effects of Manual Therapy with TECAR Therapy, on Pain, Disability and Range of Motion in Women with Non-specific Chronic Neck Pain.

Background: This study was designed to compare the effectiveness of manual therapy alone and a combination of it and TECAR (Transfer Energy Capacitive and Resistive) therapies on the conditions of pain, disability, and neck range of motion (ROM) in patients with non-specific chronic neck pain (NCNP).

Methods: In this Randomized controlled study, 30 women with non-specific chronic neck pain were randomly divided into two groups: Manual therapy along with TECAR therapy (intervention group) and single manual therapy (control group). The participants were homogenized in terms of age, height, and weight. Both groups received manual therapy for two weeks and a total of 8 sessions. Furthermore, self-stretching the scalene muscles, upper trapezius, and suboccipital muscles was taught to the participants. After the treatment ended, patients were followed up for two weeks. The primary outcomes in this study were pain and disability. The pain was measured with the VAS index, and disability was measured with two questionnaires, namely the neck disability index (NDI) and neck pain disability scale (NPDS). The secondary outcomes in this study were neck flexion and extension AROM measured with a goniometer. Pain was evaluated in four stages, including before the treatment onset, at the end of session 4, at the end of treatment and after a two-week follow-up, and other conditions were measured in three stages including before the treatment onset, at the end of treatment and after a two-week follow-up. The Repeated Measure ANOVA (2*3), the Wilcoxon test, and the Paired Student's t-test were used. The significance level was set at P ˂ 0.05.

Results: The comparison of the two groups indicated that at the end of the treatment period and after the follow-up, the average pain level in the intervention group was lower than that of the control group. The effect size also revealed that the combination of manual and TECAR therapies acts effectively in pain reduction. Furthermore, the combinatorial treatment compared to the single manual therapy was preferable to improving the disability, while after the two-week follow-up period, no statistically significant difference was observed between the two groups. The comparison of neck flexion and extension AROM did not reveal any difference between the two groups. The intragroup comparison also revealed that both the control and intervention groups experienced a significant decrease in pain intensity and disability level and a significant increase in neck flexion and extension AROM after the end of treatment and after a two-week follow-up compared to before the treatment (P> 0.05).

Conclusion: Based on the results of this study, TECAR seems to be able to increase the effectiveness of manual treatments as a thermal modality.