Acupuncture in medicine : journal of the British Medical Acupuncture Society
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Effects of dry needling in the sternocleidomastoid muscle on cervical motor control in patients with neck pain: a randomised clinical trial.
To determine the changes produced by trigger point dry needling (TrP-DN) of sternocleidomastoid in patients with neck pain, and to observe how it might modify cervical motor control (CMC). ⋯ The effects of TrP-DN inside and outside of active myofascial trigger points did not differ in this study. Both interventions were associated with a similar temporal effect, specifically a reduction in neck pain at 1 week and an increase CMC at 1 month. However, these findings should be interpreted with caution due to the lack of a contemporaneous untreated control group.