Fibromyalgia

The effectiveness of chiropractic management of fibromyalgia patients: a pilot study. Blunt KL, Rajwani MH, and Guerriero RC. J Manipulative Physiological Therapy; 1997:20(6):389-99.

Twenty-one rheumatology patients aged 25-70 suffering from fibromyalgia (muscular pain characterized by muscular tautness/stiffness, well-defined tender/trigger points, numbness, tingling, and pain) were studied to demonstrate chiropractic’s effect on this condition.

From the abstract:

Objective:
To demonstrate the effectiveness of chiropractic management for fibromyalgia patients using reported pain levels, cervical and lumbar ranges of motion, strength, flexibility, tender points, myalgic score and perceived functional ability as outcome measures.

Chiropractic interventions:
Treatment consisted of 4 weeks of spinal manipulation, soft tissue and passive stretching at the chiropractors’ discretion.

Results:
Chiropractic management improved patients’ cervical and lumbar ranges of motion, straight leg raise and reported pain levels. These chances were judged to be clinically important with the confines of our sample only.

Prospective, longitudinal study of service utilization and costs in fibromyalgia. Wolf F. Anderson J, Harkness, D et al. Iarthritis and Rheumatism, 1997; 40, pp.1560-70.

In this study of 538 fibromyalgia patients it was revealed that chiropractors were one of the more common health care professionals visited by patients, averaging 30.4 visits per 100 patients (per six-month period).