Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation (TENS) May Benefit Women With Fibromyalgia
Source: Thailand Medical News Jan 07, 2020 5 years, 7 months, 1 week, 12 hours, 33 minutes ago
A simple treatment involving electrical nerve stimulation helped women with
fibromyalgia in a recent clinical trial. The findings are published in
Arthritis & Rheumatology.
Typically,
fibromyalgia is characterized by pain and fatigue, particularly during physical activity. Besides widespread pain, individuals with
fibromyalgia also have sleep problems.
Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (
TENS) delivers electrical currents through the skin to activate nerve pathways in the body that inhibit pain.
TENS resulted in significant improvements in movement-related pain and fatigue compared with placebo or no
TENS in this trial.
The
transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (
TENS) treatment was given along with standard treatments for
fibromyalgia. Thus, it can provide people with a tool to help manage pain and fatigue without taking additional pain medications.
Senior author Dr Kathleen A. Sluka, PT, Ph.D., FAPTA, of the University of Iowa told
Thailand Medical News via a phone interview, "
TENS is available over the counter, is inexpensive, and is safe and easy to use. It can provide a self-management option for people with chronic pain, particularly
fibromyalgia, to provide an additional level of pain relief.”
Past research has also shown that
TENS therapy is effective for reducing pain in people who have
fibromyalgia, especially in combination with other treatments, such as exercise. However, these studies were small and the quality of the evidence was very low.
Reference : Dana L. Dailey et al, A Randomized Controlled Trial of TENS for Movement‐Evoked Pain in Women with Fibromyalgia, Arthritis & Rheumatology (2019). DOI: 10.1002/art.41170
