Trial reportPloS one2025
Effect of foot reflexology on chronic pain in Parkinson's disease: A randomized controlled trial.
Trial report in PloS one, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT04705207 (Exploratory Study of the Impact of Foot Reflexology on Chronic Pain in Parkinsonian Patients), which is not on this map. Cited by 2 papers.
What it found
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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.
Exploratory Study of the Impact of Foot Reflexology on Chronic Pain in Parkinsonian Patients
Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- Article
- Neuro-functional correlates of personality dimensions in Parkinson's disease.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
10 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesEffectiveness of Foot Reflexology (FR) on the pain intensity in Parkinson's disease (PD) compared with Sham Massage (SM).
designMonocentric, longitudinal, prospective, double-blind, randomized controlled trial. Randomization with a random number generator in the R software. Fixed-sized block randomization of 3 implemented into Clinsight.
participantsIdiopathic PD patients with chronic pain (Visual Analogue Scale (VAS)≥4) were recruited from the Toulouse University Hospital between the 14th of April 2021 and the 25th of May 2025.
interventionFour one-hour long FR or SM sessions three weeks apart with the same specialized FR researcher.
main outcome measurePain intensity change measured by the mean VAS before and after full completed interventions. The difference was compared between group using a Wilcoxon Mann Witney test. Exploratory outcome: brain functional connectivity.
results30 PD patients were randomized and analyzed. Interventions were delivered as planned for all patients. Clinical variables did not significantly differed between FR and SM groups. Mean VAS decreased by -12.3 mm ± 15.2 in FR group (n = 15) and -17.9 mm ± 29.4 in SM group (n = 15). Analyses did not reveal any significant difference between the FR and SM groups (p-value = 0.88). There are different patterns in connectivity changes in the medial pain system between responders (at least 30% pain reduction) and non-responders to both therapies. There were no adverse events.
conclusionFR is not more effective than SM in relieving chronic pain in PD. The differences in connectivity patterns within the medial pain pathway may underlie the response to tactile stimulation (FR and SM).
trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov NCT04705207.
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