Electronic acupuncture shoes may offer a non-drug alternative for chronic low back pain, producing greater pain improvement than anti-inflammatory medication at selected treatment visits.
In a prospective, double-blind, randomized controlled study, adults with chronic low back pain attended repeated clinic visits and were assigned to electronic acupuncture shoes with placebo anti-inflammatory drugs or sham shoes with anti-inflammatory drugs. Researchers assessed pain, spinal movement, time to pain remission, and quality of life throughout treatment and after treatment ended, using both intention-to-treat and per-protocol analyses.
The electronic acupuncture shoe group generally showed higher treatment success and greater reductions in pain from baseline than the anti-inflammatory drug group, with differences emerging at selected visits. Some early improvements in leftward spinal rotation were also observed, but immediate before-and-after session pain changes and quality of life did not differ between groups.
