Which pain therapy is best?
By Melanie Nelson, Public Affairs Officer
VA's whole health approach to care connects patients with other services and helps with physical, psychological, social, and economic factors that impact wellbeing.
A new research study by the Minneapolis VA Center for Care Delivery and Outcomes Research (CCDOR) finds that complementary and integrative health therapies delivered through the VA and through community care both offer potentially effective means of reducing chronic pain.
“We wanted to learn which chronic pain therapies work for Veterans and in which settings they work better. We also wanted to help inform Veterans when choosing where to seek out treatment,” said Collin Calvert, Core Investigator and Statistician.
Overall, the research team found that VA acupuncture and chiropractic had a stronger beneficial relationship with pain than community care acupuncture and chiropractic, while conversely community care medical massage therapy had a stronger beneficial relationship than VA medical massage therapy. Also of note, extrapolating to 12 visits of acupuncture therapy at the VA resulted in clinically meaningful improvements in pain interference.
While findings may demonstrate that VA does some things better than community care, and vice-versa, this almost certainly depends on who is going to which facility, the comparability of people who tend towards the VA and community care, and the quality of care across clinics.
Because the VA uses a whole health approach to care rather than focusing just on a single chief complaint or health problem, patients may be connected with other services and receive help with physical, psychological, social, and economic factors that impact wellbeing.
Dr. Steven Fu is director for the Minneapolis VA CCDOR. The Center’s mission is to improve Veterans’ health and well-being by designing, evaluating, and implementing healthcare interventions.
“Research contributes to VA health care delivery by identifying effective treatments and determining the best ways to deliver these treatments and services to Veterans,” said Fu.
The study, Complementary and Integrative Health Therapies and Pain: Delivery Through Veterans Affairs and Community Care, was published in the Global Advances in Integrative Medicine and Health last month.