Heat works better than drugs alone
Nurses and others with physically demanding jobs who are in pain from an acute lower back injury can get significant relief from a heat wrap worn over the lower back, Johns Hopkins researchers said.
Heat vs Medication for pain relief:
- More than 50 percent for the heat-therapy group
- Less than 50 percent for the standard care group.
- The benefits of heat therapy were maintained through two weeks of follow-up
- The benefits of topical heat resulted in extra pain reduction beyond that associated with pain medications alone
- The heat-therapy group also had significantly greater improvements in mobility.
So-called continuous low-level heat therapy should be considered as an adjunct or even an alternative to pharmacological management of acute lower back pain, said Edward J. Bernacki, M.D. He called the relief dramatic.
The heat wrap was put through its paces in a study of 43 nurses, nursing aides, and maintenance personnel who were treated at an occupational therapy clinic after sustaining back injuries, Standard pain medications were prescribed to all participants. All participants were treated identically based on their symptomology. 25 of the participants were randomly selected to wear a heat wrap eight hours a day for three days. All participants kept a pain diary and log of medications they took.
After one day, participants wearing the wrap improved by nearly two points from baseline on a 10-point pain-intensity scale, compared with less than one point of improvement in the standard care group.
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