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Aquatic (pool) therapy and physical therapy are two treatments that may reduce pain. But which one is best for chronic low back pain? A small randomized trial published online January 3, 2022 JAMA Network Open. This suggests that buoyancy has a bonus. Researchers took a gaggle of 113 individuals with chronic low back pain, ages 18 to 65, and divided them into two groups. One group had two 60-minute physical therapy sessions per week. Others participated in two 60-minute sessions of pool exercises each week. After 12 weeks, about half of the people within the pool therapy group showed an improvement of two to five points of their pain scores (depending on the dimensions), compared with only 21 percent or less within the physical therapy group. And a 12 months later, the pool exercisers still felt higher than the land exercisers. Researchers say that pool therapy has a greater effect than physical therapy on pain, function, quality of life, sleep quality and mental state.
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