Chiropractic and Trigger Point Therapy

Numerous research studies have shown that chiropractic adjustments are very effective for treating tension headaches, especially headaches that originate in the neck.

A report released in 2001 by researchers at the Duke University Evidence-Based Practice Center in Durham, NC, found that "spinal manipulation resulted in almost immediate improvement for those headaches that originate in the neck, and had significantly fewer side effects and longer-lasting relief of tension-type headache than commonly prescribed medications." These findings support an earlier study published in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics that found spinal manipulative therapy to be very effective for treating tension headaches. This study also found that those who stopped chiropractic treatment after four weeks continued to experience a sustained benefit in contrast to those patients who received pain medication.

Trigger point therapy for headaches tends to involve four maintaining the proper movement and positioning between the first cervical vertebra and the base of the skull.

Research shows that neck pain sufferers often also endure migraine and tension-type head-aches. Why? The same vertebral subluxations that cause neck pain are also linked to head pain. Fortunately, scientific studies show that chiropractic care may prevent migraines and headaches. In one report, researchers divided 127 migraine sufferers into two groups. While 83 patients underwent chiropractic care, the remaining 44 formed a control group that received no chiropractic adjustments. After two months of care, the chiropractic patients reported “statistically significant” improvements in migraine frequency and duration, compared with the control group. The chiropractic group also used less medication and had less disability than controls.

- J Manipulative Physiol Ther 2000;23;91

Seventy two percent of migraine sufferers experience improvement after two months of chiropractic care, according to a scientific trial undertaken at Macquarie University in New South Wales, Australia. Around 22 percent of patients had substantial reduction-(more than 60 percent of their symptoms reduced) during the course of the treatment. What makes this an impressive study is that this was a very chronic group-(the average length of time they had had migraines was 18 years). To get a change of that sort of magnitude in a very chronic group was remarkable. Another 50 percent had quite noticeable improvement (they either found that the frequency of the migraines was less, the length of time they had them was less or they didn’t need to use their medications as much).

Research Australia, July 2005