Background & Aims
Neck pain prevalence ranks second in musculoskeletal disorders globally and has made little change in prevalence from 1990-2019. Neck pain is often associated with poor movement control; however, there is a lack of reliable and clinically accessible measurement tools to assess movement control in people with neck pain. The Neckcare System (NCS) is a new tool with great potential to improve the understanding and management of neck pain by providing novel data on movement control. However, patient perspectives are known drivers of outcomes with pain interventions, and understanding patient perspectives may be important for optimizing patient buy-in with this new technology. The purpose of this study is to describe patients’ perspectives with the integration of the NCS in the clinical management of their neck pain.
Methods
Patients seeking physical therapy (PT) for neck pain (n=25) were recruited from 2 outpatient clinics for this qualitative study. Given that this study was associated with the clinical integration of new technology, a generic qualitative design was employed to maximize flexibility and practical application of study activities. Semi-structured interviews were performed after patients completed 3 assessment sessions over 6 weeks with the NCS. Rapid Qualitative Analysis was used to analyze interview transcripts and develop matrices of qualitative findings that explored patients’ 1) experience with the NCS, 2) understanding of the assessment results, and 3) ideas for optimizing integration with PT care.
Results
Patients highlighted the ability to track their progression, receive visual and objective feedback, and receive information about how they control their movements as important benefits of the NCS. One patient expressed “Because it’s all kinda subjective… But having something like this that can straight up tell me, a month ago, you could only move your neck this much, now you’re moving your neck this much.” Patients often discussed their understanding of NCS results in connection with function and their pain. For example, one patient stated, “So it’s a great way of kind of getting a self-understanding of where the pain starts, where it is not.” Patients expressed this information could be integrated into physical therapy care by providing more specificity to their diagnoses, guiding treatment, and for use as a communication tool to patients and other care team members.
Conclusions
Patients highly valued the added visual feedback of performance and results provided by the figures and tables in the NCS output. Visual information provided them with more meaningful information on their neck movement and improved ability to track their progress over time. Using this information, patients drew connections between their pain, the treatment strategies used in PT, and their progress. Patients felt awareness of these connections made them more capable of being actively engaged in their rehabilitation process (i.e. better able to ask questions and be involved in development of treatment plan). Patients described different components of a bidirectional relationship where pain helped them to understand the results of the NCS, but also the results of the NCS helped them better understand their pain. This was highlighted by the fact that those who did not have pain while performing the assessments tended to ascribe less meaning to the NCS results.
References
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Presenting Author
Chelsea Miller
Poster Authors
Chelsea Miller
PT
University of Miami
Lead Author
Gabriel Gonzalez
The University of Miami
Lead Author
Claudia Hernandez
University of Miami
Lead Author
Juan Gonzalez
University of Miami, Department of Physical Therapy, APReCIAT Lab
Lead Author
Marlon Wong
PT
University of Miami
Lead Author
Topics
- Specific Pain Conditions/Pain in Specific Populations: Neck Pain