SynthesisThe Journal of manual & manipulative therapy2026
Efficacy of cervical physical therapy on pain sensitivity in patients with migraine compared to no treatment, sham treatment or usual medical care: a systematic review and meta-analysis.
Synthesis in The Journal of manual & manipulative therapy, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
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.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo examine the efficacy of cervical physical therapy (e.g. cervical mobilization, exercise, and myofascial treatments) on pressure pain thresholds (PPTs) in patients with migraine, compared to no treatment, sham treatment, or usual medical care.
methodA systematic search was performed in PubMed, Embase.com, Web of Science, SPORTDiscus, Cinahl Plus and PEDro. Two independent reviewers assessed the selected randomized controlled trials (RCTs). The risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane risk of bias tool 2, and the certainty of evidence was evaluated according to the GRADE approach. The meta-analysis included PPTs from cervical muscles and cephalic muscles.
resultsFive papers out of 965 screened papers met our inclusion criteria, of which two originated from the same randomized controlled trial. Four RCTs had some risk of bias due to the absence of a pre-specified analysis plan and missing outcome data. One RCT had a high risk of bias due to a lack of information on concealment and blinding. All studies reported increased PPTs after cervical treatment. However, statistically significant differences were only found for the sternocleidomastoid muscle (mean difference (MD) 1.13 kg/cm
conclusionThe efficacy of cervical physical therapy on PPTs is uncertain. More studies of high methodological quality are needed to elucidate the pain-modulatory effects of cervical physical therapy in migraine.
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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.