When researchers have gone through over 300 studies comparing different treatments for back pain with placebo, it turns out that few have an effect.
In the studies, they have looked at both medications and treatments such as physical exercise, massage, acupuncture, and spinal manipulation.
According to the findings, published in the journal BMJ Evidence-based medicine, only so-called NSAIDs – including medications like ibuprofen – have an effect on acute and short-term back pain.
When it comes to chronic pain, five alternatives were found to have a certain, albeit small, pain-relieving effect. These were physical exercise, spinal manipulation (by a naprapath or chiropractor), antidepressant medications, taping, or a cream that provides a warm sensation.
Other conclusions were that neither exercise nor injections with steroids or paracetamol helped against acute pain. Local anesthesia such as lidocaine and antibiotics did not help against chronic pain.
Against chronic back pain, exercise may have a certain effect. But it's about fairly small changes. On a 100-point scale, the pain decreased by an average of almost 8.
For many other treatments, the results were uncertain, both for acute and chronic pain. This applied, for example, to acupuncture, massage, osteopathy, and TENS (electrical nerve stimulation), as well as certain muscle-relaxing medications.
