Adding Manipulation and Electrical Dry Needling to Conventional Care for Lumbar Spinal Stenosis

Physical therapists and physical therapist assistants who treat older adults with degenerative lumbar spinal stenosis and want a clear account of what this trial tested, what it found, and where the evidence stops.

Licensed physical therapists and physical therapist assistants working in outpatient orthopedic, spine, geriatric and manual therapy settings. Physical therapist assistants participate under the direction of the supervising physical therapist.

Intended audience

Physical Therapy

Level

Intermediate

Delivery format

Online, asynchronous, self-paced course: interactive reading with audio or video, and a scored post-test.

Based on

This course is based on a single peer-reviewed source: Young I, Dunning J, Butts R, Bliton P, Zacharko N, Garcia J, Mourad F, Charlebois C, Gorby P, Fernández-de-las-Peñas C. “Spinal manipulation and electrical dry needling as an adjunct to conventional physical therapy in patients with lumbar spinal stenosis: a multi-center randomized clinical trial.” The Spine Journal, 2023. Open access under the CC BY license.

Every finding, number and conclusion presented in this course is drawn from that article. Nothing has been added from other literature, and no clinical recommendation is issued here that the authors did not make themselves.

After completing this course, you will be able to:

1. Describe the patient population, the two treatment arms and the follow-up schedule used in this multi-center randomized trial of lumbar spinal stenosis.
2. State what the trial found for pain, disability and patient-reported success at three months, and at which earlier follow-up points the groups did not clearly differ.
3. Explain the limitations the authors identified, including the absence of a sham-needling group and the added treatment time in the combined-intervention arm.

1. Start Here: how this course works and what the source is
2. Audio Lesson: The Trial in Brief (about ten minutes)
3. Who Was Studied and What the Trial Asked
4. Inside the Two Treatment Arms
5. Pain, Disability and Patient-Reported Success at Three Months
6. Side Effects and What the Authors Could Not Answer
7. Reading This Trial Alongside Conservative Care for Stenosis
8. Key Takeaways
9. Post-Test and Course Evaluation

Quinn Millington, PT, DPT, ECS is the instructor of record: the licensed clinician who reviewed this course and signed off on it. The name and credentials print on the certificate.

Disclosures. This course was developed by The ConEd Solution, which has a financial interest in its sale. No outside funding or sponsorship was received. The instructor of record has no affiliation with the authors of the source publication or their institutions.

This course awards 0.5 contact hours (30 min). How you earn them:

1. Complete the course. Every lesson, in order.
2. Pass the post-test. Score 80% or higher. Retakes are allowed.
3. Complete the evaluation. A short form rating each learning objective and the course.
4. Download your certificate. It is issued on completion and stays available in My Account.

The episode time is its measured length. Reading, post-test and evaluation times are estimates.

This course is designed to satisfy the quality requirements state boards set for continuing education. Requirements vary by state, and confirming that a course fits your renewal is up to you. Each state’s own acceptance statement is in the credit panel on this page.

1. This course is based on a single peer-reviewed source: Young I, Dunning J, Butts R, Bliton P, Zacharko N, Garcia J, Mourad F, Charlebois C, Gorby P, Fernández-de-las-Peñas C. “Spinal manipulation and electrical dry needling as an adjunct to conventional physical therapy in patients with lumbar spinal stenosis: a multi-center randomized clinical trial.” The Spine Journal, 2023. Open access under the CC BY license.
2. Every finding, number and conclusion presented in this course is drawn from that article. Nothing has been added from other literature, and no clinical recommendation is issued here that the authors did not make themselves.