The Effect of Harmonic Technique vs End Range Loading Exercises on Pain and Disability in Patients With Non-Specific Chronic Low Back Pain: A Preliminary Study

ObjectiveThe purpose of this study was to compare the effects of end range loading (ERL) vs harmonic technique (HT) on patients with chronic low back pain (LBP).MethodFourteen volunteer patients with LBP were randomly assigned to 2 groups based on a blocked randomization method with 7 patients in the HT group and 7 patients in the ERL group. The patients received 10 sessions of treatment for 5 sessions per week. Pain intensity and disability score were recorded using the numeric pain scale and Roland-Morris Disability questionnaire (RMQ), respectively, before and after the treatment period.ResultsAlthough pain intensity (P = .02) and the RMQ score (P = .03) decreased in the HT technique group, no statistically significant change was found in the ERL group for the RMQ score (P > .05). The effect size for HT was .6 and .3 for numeric pain scale and RMQ, respectively.ConclusionThis preliminary study showed that pain intensity and disability improved in subjects with chronic LBP in the HT group. More investigations with larger sample size are needed to clarify these findings.