Antibiotics may help ease chronic back pain

Conclusion This well-designed double-blind RCT shows that the antibiotic treatment of chronic lower back pain caused by swelling of the spinal vertebrae is more effective than placebo at reducing back pain and disease-related disability The study had many strengths, including its randomised double-blind design, adequate sample size and one-year follow-up point. However, it did have some limitations, including the fact that: Patients varied at the start of the study. More people in the placebo group had lower grades of vertebrae change. This is hard to explain if allocation to the two groups had been completely concealed and fair, although it may have favoured improvements in the placebo group and therefore may not have influenced the results. Blinding of the participants may have been broken unintentionally. As this antibiotic caused such predictable bowel side effects in 65% of people taking the active treatment, it is possible that the participants knew they were taking an active treatment and therefore may have reported the subjective scores differently form the placebo group. The researchers did not report any testing for fidelity of the blinding, such as asking participants if they could guess which group they were in.  As strong as this research it is, it is not definitive. Further research, most likely with larger numbers of people in the study, will be needed to confirm these findings before any treatment is likely to be approved and licensed for routine...
Source: NHS News Feed - Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Medication Medical practice Source Type: news