Efficacy and Safety of Auriculopressure for Primary Care Patients with Chronic Non-Specific Spinal Pain: A Multicentre Randomised Controlled Trial
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Chronic uncomplicated musculoskeletal pain in the spine (cervical, thoracic or lumbar) is highly prevalent and may severely limit the daily activities of those affected by it. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of treatment with auriculopressure applied to patients with non-specific spinal pain. METHODS: A multicentre randomised controlled trial with two parallel arms (true auriculopressure (TAP) and placebo auriculopressure (PAP)) was performed. The intervention phase lasted 8 weeks and outcomes were measured 1 week after the last intervention (T1) and 6 months after baseline (T2). The primary outcome measure was change in pain intensity according to a 100 mm visual analogue scale (pain VAS) at T1. Secondary outcome measures were the Lattinen index, the McGill Pain Questionnaire and the SF-12 health-related quality of life scale (Spanish version in every case). RESULTS: There were 265 participants (TAP group, n=130; PAP group, n=135). Pain was most frequently located in the upper back (55.1%, n=146), followed by the lower back (25.3%, n=67) and the dorsal area (12.5%, n=33). Nineteen patients (7.2%) reported pain affecting the entire spine. There were statistically significant differences between TAP and PAP in the change in the pain VAS at T1 of 10 mm (95% CI 2.8 to 17.3, p=0.007) and in the change in the pain VAS at T2 of 7.2 mm (95% CI 0.02 to 14.3, p=0.049) in favour of TAP. We also observed a statistically significant difference of 3.4 points in the physical component of the SF-12 in favour of TAP at T2 (95% CI 0.45 to 6.3, p=0.024). No severe adverse effects were detected or reported during treatment. CONCLUSIONS: The application of auriculopressure in patients with non-specific spinal pain in primary healthcare is effective and safe, and therefore should be considered for inclusion in the portfolio of primary healthcare services. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: ISRCTN01897462.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.005 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.004 | 0.003 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.008 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".