Feasibility of Near-infrared Spectroscopy to Measure Cortical Pain Pathway (Brain) Activation During Dry Needling
CompletedEarly phase 1NCT04170803
View the official record on ClinicalTrials.gov Recruiting status changes often. Contact the study team listed on ClinicalTrials.gov, and talk to your doctor before joining a study.
This study has no listed site in Canada in this snapshot. It is included as part of the worldwide chronic pain corpus.
Brief summary (from the registry)
The benefit experienced by some patients when treated with dry needling,1 combined with the field-expedient nature of this intervention, make dry needling uniquely suited for the military healthcare environment. An improved understanding of the mechanism by which dry needling exerts its clinical benefits will allow clinicians to adopt more efficacious treatment strategies for Soldiers with chronic musculoskeletal pain. The proposed study will utilize functional near-infrared spectroscopy and structural health monitoring (SHM) to provide insight on the central and peripheral mechanisms of dry needling. Phase 1 will compare the cortical pain pathway response of thirty participants with non-traumatic shoulder pain receiving either true or sham dry needling. An additional 15 participants will be enrolled to receive true dry needling to determine if brain responses may be able to predict clinical improvement (responders versus non-responders) in phase 2. Since chronic pain after musculoskeletal injury is the leading cause of medical discharge from service and a primary source of disability in the U.S. military2,3, improved complementary and alternative treatment strategies have the potential to have a large impact on both military readiness and health care costs within the Armed Forces.
Study details
- Official title
- Feasibility of Near-infrared Spectroscopy to Measure Cortical Pain Pathway (Brain) Activation During Dry Needling
- Conditions
- Shoulder Pain
- Chronic Pain
- Musculoskeletal Injury
- Interventions
- Device: Dry Needling
- Other: Sham Dry Needling
- Sponsor
- Army-Baylor University Doctoral Program in Physical Therapy
- Collaborators
- Brooke Army Medical Center
- Start date
- 2019-01-08
- Primary completion
- 2019-07-09
- Sex
- All
- Age range
- from 18 Years to 50 Years
- Results posted
- No results posted in this snapshot
- Countries
- United States
- Total sites listed
- 1
Eligibility criteria
Show eligibility criteria (verbatim from the registry)
Inclusion Criteria: (all of the following) Active duty DoD beneficiary Age 18-50 years old Non-traumatic shoulder pain rated at least 4/10 on the Numeric Pain Rating Scale Right-handed Exclusion Criteria: * Anticoagulant medication use Bleeding disorders Shoulder pain referred from cervical spine Full-thickness rotator cuff tears Known pregnancy Inability to lie prone Left- or mixed-handed
Source: ClinicalTrials.gov (US National Library of Medicine), snapshot October 2026. Check the registry for current recruiting status. Record: https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT04170803