IF LOW-BACK PAIN PATIENTS REPORT RELIEF FROM TENS, SHOULD PHYSICIANS ADVISE THEM TO DISCONTINUE TREATMENT?
As always, the treating physician is in the best position to determine if a treatment is of benefit to an individual. There are many other treatments, such as exercise, that are proven to help patients with chronic low-back pain. HOW DIFFICULT IS IT TO GAUGE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF TENS, WHEN PAIN IS SUBJECTIVE? There are many validated scales used to measure the severity of pain, and more important, the effects of pain on individual quality of life. The important thing is to determine if there is a difference in pain relief between TENS and placebo such as sham TENS. THERE WERE A SMALL NUMBER OF BLINDED, SHAM-TENS STUDIES. WERE THERE ENOUGH DATA TO REVIEW? There are enough data to go on — two Class I studies were evaluated. In the first — TENS, TENS-sham, exercise, and no exercise — were compared in chronic low-back pain patients. No benefit was found for TENS compared to TENS-sham, but benefit was found comparing exercise to no exercise. In the other Class I study, TENS vs. TENS-sham wa
