Education has long been used as part of a treatment or in attempt to prevent neck or low back pain. A recent meta-analysis concluded that education is ineffective, and not recommended in treating or preventing neck or low back pain. While at first hand, this looks like a big blow for the for the many clinicians promoting modern pain science to patients as an effective tool in the battle against chronic pain it is everything but. In a Letter to the Editor in “Manual Therapy”, it is highlighted that not all education is equal.
We can change patient behavior and beliefs, and one powerful tool is education. For chronic pain, we need to shift our own and our patients’ focus from tissues to the brain and nervous system. It is time to embrace the complexity of pain.
> From: Hurley et al., Man Ther (2016-07-01 07:48:24) (Epub ahead of print). All rights reserved to Elsevier Ltd. Click here for the online summary.