Comparison of Dry Needling versus Orthopedic Manual Therapy in Patients with Myofascial Chronic Neck Pain: A Single-Blind, Randomized Pilot Study
Table 3
Comparison of changes in VAS over time for each treatment group.
Measure
Groups
Baseline mean ± SD
Post 1 mean (95% CI)
Post 2 mean (95% CI)
Follow-up mean (95% CI)
Follow-up versus baseline
Post 1 versus baseline
Post 2 versus baseline
Mean difference (95% CI)
value
Mean difference (95% CI)
value
Mean difference (95% CI)
value
VAS
DN-S
33.8 ± 11.7
39.7 (28.4 to 51.0)
36.0 (24.0 to 48.0)
13.3 (3.9 to 22.7)
20.5 (7.0 to 33.9)
0.001
−5.9 (−5.9 to 17.7)
1.0
−2.1 (−14.1 to 18.4)
1.0
STT
50.2 ± 17.7
38.2 (26.0 to 49.4)
30.1 (18.0 to 42.1)
34.3 (24.9 to 43.7)
15.9 (2.4 to 15.0)
0.001
−12.0 (−23.9 to −0.2)
0.04
−20.1 (−36.4 to −3.8)
0.01
OMT
42.1 ± 16.3
29.8 (18.5 to 41.1)
23.0 (10.8 to 35.0)
9.4 (0.03 to 18.8)
32.7 (19.3 to 46.2)
0.001
−12.3 (−24.2 to −0.4)
0.03
−19.2 (−35.5 to −3.0)
0.01
VAS = visual analog scale, DN-S = dry needling + stretching, STT = soft tissue techniques, OMT = orthopedic manual therapy, and 95% CI = 95% confidence interval. . Mean diff = difference among groups for the least squares mean (adjusted for baseline and missing data).
