Australian Journal of Physiotherapy
Volume 53, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 155–160
In chronic low back pain, low level laser therapy combined with exercise is more beneficial than exercise alone in the long term: a randomised trial
Gholamreza Esmaeeli Djavid
Question
Is low level laser therapy an effective adjuvant intervention for chronic low back pain?
Design
Randomised trial with concealed allocation, blinded assessors and intention-to-treat analysis.
Participants
Sixty-one patients who had low back pain for at least 12 weeks.
Intervention
One group received laser therapy alone, one received laser therapy and exercise, and the third group received placebo laser therapy and exercise. Laser therapy was performed twice a week for 6 weeks.
Outcome
Outcomes were pain severity measured using a 10-cm visual analogue scale, lumbar range of motion measured by the Schober Test and maximum active flexion, extension and lateral flexion, and disability measured with the Oswestry Disability Index on admission to the study, after 6 weeks of intervention, and after another 6 weeks of no intervention.
Results
There was no greater effect of laser therapy compared with exercise for any outcome, at either 6 or 12 weeks. There was also no greater effect of laser therapy plus exercise compared with exercise for any outcome at 6 weeks. However, in the laser therapy plus exercise group pain had reduced by 1.8 cm (95% CI 0.1 to 3.3, p = 0.03), lumbar range of movement increased by 0.9 cm (95% CI 0.2 to 1.8, p < 0.01) on the Schober Test and by 15 deg (95% CI 5 to 25, p < 0.01) of active flexion, and disability reduced by 9.4 points (95% CI 2.7 to 16.0, p = 0.03) more than in the exercise group at 12 weeks.
Conclusion
In chronic low back pain, low level laser therapy combined with exercise is more beneficial than exercise alone in the long term.
Laser irradiation was performed with a Gallium-AluminumArsenide(GaAlAs) λ=810 nm, 50 mW, continuous wave, and 0.2211 cm2 spot area laser. The power output was calibrated with a thermopile power metre. In each session, a series of standardised fields including eight points in the paravertebral region (L2 to S2–S3) were irradiated by a single laser probe in contact mode (Gur et al 2003). In the laser therapy groups, participants were irradiated with the probe emitting a dose of 27 J/cm2 while the placebo laser therapy group was irradiated with inactive probes. It took approximately 20 minutes to cover the area for each participant.