November 2006

$2.4 million awarded for joint research effort

The United States Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) granted $2.4 million for a study on back-related leg pain, to be conducted by The Wolfe-Harris Center for Clinical Studies (WHCCS) at Northwestern Health Sciences and the Palmer Center for Chiropractic Research (PCCR) at Palmer College of Chiropractic, Davenport campus.

Northwester Health Sciences and Palm applied for the grant last summer.

Jointly, the colleges will conduct the first full-scale randomized clinical trial examining chiropractic treatment for chronic and sub-acute back-related leg pain. Back-related leg pain includes pain originating in the low back and traveling down one or both legs. The study builds upon two previous pilot studies conducted at Northwestern that have been published in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics.

Over the next three years, 192 patients with back-related leg pain will be recruited for the study; 122 will be recruited from the Twin Cities and treated at Northwestern. An additional 70 individuals will be recruited from the Quad Cities area and treated at Palmer. Patients will be placed in two groups. One group will receive chiropractic care combined with exercise instructions. The other group will receive exercise instructions alone.

Source: Northwestern Health Sciences University, www.nwhealth.edu

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