Trial reportThe Journal of manual & manipulative therapy2022
Effect of dry needling on lumbar muscle stiffness in patients with low back pain: A double blind, randomized controlled trial using shear wave elastography.
Trial report in The Journal of manual & manipulative therapy, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to 2 registered trials, which are not on this map. Cited by 14 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
The Effect of Abdominal and Lumbar Muscle Stiffness Assessed by Elastography on Vertebral Fractures: A Cross-Sectional Study in Women Over 60
Efficacy of Dry Needling for Releasing the Sacrotuberous Ligament on Pain Intensity, Functional Disability, and Biomechanical Changes in Patients With Sacroiliac Joint Dysfunctions
Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 14 citations in OpenAlex.
- Changes of trunk muscle stiffness in individuals with low back pain: a systematic review with meta-analysis.BMC musculoskeletal disorders · 2024Pooled it
- Systematic Review to Inform a World Health Organization (WHO) Clinical Practice Guideline: Benefits and Harms of Needling Therapies for Chronic Primary Low Back Pain in Adults.Journal of occupational rehabilitation · 2023Pooled it
- Treating myofascial pain with dry needling: a systematic review for the best evidence-based practices in low back pain.Arquivos de neuro-psiquiatria · 2023Pooled it
- The consistency of reporting adverse events associated with dry needling: a narrative review.The Journal of the Canadian Chiropractic Association · 2026Article
- Shear Wave Elastography in Musculoskeletal Imaging: A Narrative Review.Journal of clinical medicine · 2026Review
- Reproducibility of a Shear Wave Elastography Procedure for Assessing the Piriformis Muscle Stiffness in a Sample of Healthy Young Adults Under Controlled Laboratory Conditions: An Intra- and Inter-Examiner Reliability Study.Journal of clinical medicine · 2026Article
- Advances in mechanical assessments of in vivo human lumbar spine tissues with noninvasive imaging techniques.npj biomedical innovations · 2026Review
- From mechanotransduction to manual therapy: advances in piezo/TRP channels and lumbar degeneration.Frontiers in physiology · 2026Review
- Bridging physics and biology in acupuncture: flexible multimodal bioelectronics for decoding the deqi microenvironment.Frontiers in bioengineering and biotechnology · 2026Review
- Toward visualized pathophenotyping: a multimodal imaging-guided conceptual framework for chronic low back pain.Frontiers in medicine · 2026Article
- Global Trends and Hotspots in Ultrasound Imaging for Rehabilitation Research: A Bibliometric and Visualization Analysis.Journal of multidisciplinary healthcare · 2025Article
- Ultrasound elastography of back muscle biomechanical properties: a systematic review and meta-analysis of current methods.Insights into imaging · 2024Review
- The effects of a 12-week combined motor control exercise and isolated lumbar extension intervention on lumbar multifidus muscle stiffness in individuals with chronic low back pain.Frontiers in physiology · 2024Article
- Acute effects of proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation stretching on rectus femoris muscle stiffness: a dose-response shear-wave elastography study.Frontiers in physiology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 5 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundDry needling treatment focuses on restoring normal muscle function in patients with musculoskeletal pain; however, little research has investigated this assertion. Shear wave elastography (SWE) allows quantification of individual muscle function by estimating both resting and contracted muscle stiffness.
objectiveTo compare the effects of dry needling to sham dry needling on lumbar muscle stiffness in individuals with low back pain (LBP) using SWE.
methodsSixty participants with LBP were randomly allocated to receive one session of dry needling or sham dry needling treatment to the lumbar multifidus and erector spinae muscles on the most painful side and spinal level. Stiffness (shear modulus) of the lumbar multifidus and erector spinae muscles was assessed using SWE at rest and during submaximal contraction before treatment, immediately after treatment, and 1 week later. Treatment effects were estimated using linear mixed models.
resultsAfter 1 week, resting erector spinae muscle stiffness was lower in individuals who received dry needling than those that received sham dry needling. All other between-groups differences in muscle stiffness were similar, but non-significant.
conclusionDry needling appears to reduce resting erector spinae muscle following treatment of patients with LBP. Therefore, providers should consider the use of dry needling when patients exhibit aberrant stiffness of the lumbar muscles.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.