The effect of six weeks of cognitive functional therapy‎ on pain, disability and fear of movement in ‎people with chronic non-specific neck pain

Neck pain is one of the most common problems in human societies. There are many factors involved in the etiology of neck pain, and cognitive problems related to pain are among the most important factors involved for non-specific neck pain. ‎The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of six weeks of functional cognitive training on the pain intensity, disability and Kinesiophobia in people with non-specific chronic neck pain.

The present study was a clinical trial study with one intervention group and one control group. In this clinical trial study, 24 patients with chronic neck pain were randomly divided into two ‎groups of Cognitive Functional Exercise (n=12) and Control (n=12). ‎‎ The variables of pain intensity, disability and Kinesiophobia ‎ were evaluated before and immediately after six weeks of cognitive exercises by Visual Analog Scale, neck disability questionnaire and Tampa Scale of Kinesiophobia, respectively. Data were analyzed using Repeated Measures ANOVA and paired t-test. ‎

Comparing the two groups after treatment, there was a significant difference in pain intensity (P = 0.001), disability index (P = 0.001) and Tampa Scale of Kinesiophobia (P = 0.001) was observed, so that in the intervention group in all factors a significant decrease was observed. Also, the results of the T-pair test showed that there is a significant difference in the group of intervention before and after the test in all variables (P = 0.001). But there was no significant difference for the control group.

The findings showed that the intervention of functional cognitive exercises improves pain, disability and Kinesiophobia in people with chronic neck pain, so it is suggested that functional cognitive exercises can be used as a complementary method in improving individuals with non-specific chronic neck pain.