Background & Aims

Exercises are widely used and recommended as treatment for people with fibromyalgia. Usually, healthcare professionals are more inclined to recommend aerobic exercises for this population arguing that this type of exercise is more effective in providing analgesia for this population. Recent evidence has shown that resistance exercises are beneficial for people with fibromyalgia [1]. However, resistance exercises are not the first type of exercises chosen for this population, and one of the reasons is that it is not well established whether this type of exercise can lead to similar levels of analgesia for people with fibromyalgia. As such, we compared the analgesia induced by a forty-minute exercise session (resistance training vs. aerobic) in patients with fibromyalgia.

Methods

The present experimental study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Universidade Federal de São Carlos. We included patients with fibromyalgia, according to the 2016 ACR diagnostic criteria [2]. Patients were divided into two groups (walking and resistance training) and underwent a 40-minute exercise session of moderate intensity. We compared (via t-test) the analgesia induced by different types of exercise before and immediately after the exercise session using the temporal summation of pain test with a pressure algometer. Force-controlled mechanical stimulation was applied to the flexor digitorum muscle of the forearm in a series of short contacts (1 constant stimulus of 30 seconds followed by self-report of pain every 10 seconds). Our hypothesis was that both types of exercise would lead to similar levels of analgesia immediately after an exercise session.

Results

The sample consisted of 17 women with similar age and widespread pain (p >0.5): walking (n=8; age 46.9±12.2 years) and resistance training (n=9, age 46.2±9.4 years). We did not observe significant differences (p >.05) in the analgesia induced by the different types of exercise (walking vs. resistance training) when comparing the temporal summation of the pain test, indicating that both exercises seem to have the same analgesic effect on pain after a forty-minute session.

Conclusions

The present results show that both aerobic and resistance training produce similar responses of analgesia in people with fibromyalgia after a forty-minute exercise session. This can help clinicians to elaborate a treatment protocol for this population, widening their options of possible exercise interventions.

References

1. Busch AJ, Webber SC, Richards RS, Bidonde J, Schachter CL, Schafer LA, et al. Resistance exercise training for fibromyalgia. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2013;2013.
2. Wolfe F, Clauw DJ, Fitzcharles M-A, Goldenberg DL, Häuser W, Katz RL, et al. 2016 Revisions to the 2010/2011 fibromyalgia diagnostic criteria. Semin Arthritis Rheum. 2016;46:319–29.
3. Busch AJ, Webber SC, Brachaniec M, Bidonde J, Bello-Haas VD, Danyliw AD, et al. Exercise Therapy for Fibromyalgia. Curr Pain Headache Rep. 2011;15:358–67.
4. Pontes-Silva A, Dibai-Filho AV, de Melo TS, Santos LM, de Souza MC, DeSantana JM, et al. Effects of progressive intensity resistance training on the impact of fibromyalgia: protocol for a blinded randomized controlled trial. BMC Musculoskelet Disord. 2023;24:816.

Presenting Author

Mariana Avila

Poster Authors

Mariana Avila

PhD

Universidade Federal de São Carlos

Lead Author

André Pontes-Silva

MSc

Lead Author

Thayná Melo

undergrad PT student

Lead Author

Leticia Santos

undergrad PT student

UFSCar (Brazil)

Lead Author

Giovanna Castro

undergrad PT student

UFSCar (Brazil)

Lead Author

Isadora Barbosa

PT

UFSCar (Brazil)

Lead Author

Almir Vieira Dibai-Filho

Ph.D.

Federal University of Maranhão

Lead Author

Topics

  • Specific Pain Conditions/Pain in Specific Populations: Fibromyalgia