Somatic Dysfunction - Research

Research

Research in somatic dysfunction and the use of osteopathic manipulative medicine (OMM), also called osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT) has resulted in mixed conclusions. In an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine in November 1999, researchers concluded that osteopathic manipulative medicine and traditional drug therapy resulted in equivalent resolution of lower back pain in a nearly identical time frame. The difference was that those receiving osteopathic manipulative medicine required less pharmaceutical intervention. The advantage of osteopathic manipulative medicine was diminution of adverse drug reactions while the disadvantage was the greater amount of physician time required for each patient.

However, a meta-analysis of six randomized controlled trials of osteopathic manipulative treatment that involved blinded assessments of low back pain in ambulatory settings found from computerized bibliographic searches of MEDLINE, EMBASE, MANTIS, OSTMED, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, found that osteopathic manipulative treatment significantly reduces low back pain. The analysis also concluded that the level of pain reduction is greater than expected from placebo effects alone and persists for at least three months.