Effectiveness of Bowen Therapy for Fibromyalgia: A Randomized Controlled Trial
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background: Research indicates that chronic inflammation of the fascia and an impaired healing response contribute to central pain sensitization in fibromyalgia. The International School of Bowen Therapy (ISBT)-Bowen Therapy is a manual therapy that may stimulate the flow of blood and lymph, thus activating the body's healing mechanisms. Objective: The main objective of this study is to determine the effectiveness of Bowen therapy in alleviating pain, enhancing functional capability, reducing sleep and mood disturbances, and improving quality of life in patients with fibromyalgia. Methods: Seventy-eight patients were randomly assigned to either the ISBT-Bowen Therapy (BT) (n = 40) or Control (CT) (n = 38) group in this randomized controlled trial. The BT group received eight sessions of Bowen therapy over 12 weeks, in addition to their conventional pain treatment, while the CT group did not receive Bowen therapy but continued their conventional treatment. Both groups were followed for 12 weeks after treatment. The primary outcome was pain intensity, measured by the Numeric Rating Scale. Secondary outcomes included limb endurance, activity interference, sleep disturbance, psychological distress, and quality of life. Results: The median age of the patients was 58 (interquartile range (IQR): 50-62) years, and 68 of them (87%) were female. While there was no significant difference in pain intensity over time between the two groups, patients experienced improved endurance in the lower extremities (p < 0.001) and dominant arm (p = 0.020), reduced activity interference by pain (p = 0.005), and improved mental health-related quality of life (p = 0.002) after BT. Conclusion: ISBT-Bowen Therapy may be effective for fibromyalgia patients in improving limb endurance, reducing activity interference, and enhancing quality of life.
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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 | 0.004 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.006 | 0.003 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.011 | 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".