Effect of psychotherapy during physiotherapy in patients with cervical spondylosis

    YIN Xiaoª²Tao1, WANG Jiaª²Tong3, HU Xiaoª²Min2, YIN Wen2

    1Department of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation, 2Department of Emergency, Xijing Hospital, 3Department of Psychology, School of Aerospace Medicine, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi¬ðan 710033, China

    ¡¾Abstract¡¿ AIM: To evaluate the mental status and the differences in the outcomes between the comprehensive treatment of physiotherapy and psychotherapy and mere physiotherapeutic treatment in patients with cervical spondylosis. METHODS: Sixty patients, who met the cervical spondylosis diagnostic standards, were randomly divided into control group (physiotherapy and rehabilitation training) and therapy group(treated with both physiotherapy, rehabilitation training and psychotherapy). Mental health status was evaluated with the Symptom Checklist(SCLª²90) introduced and revised by Wenª²Yuan Wu, and personality characteristics were evaluated with the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire(EPQ) revised by Yaoª²Xian Gong. The efficacy of physiotherapy and rehabilitation training was evaluated with activity of daily living (ADL) scale(Barthel index). The evaluations were conducted at the beginning of the study and 3 months later. The results were analyzed with SPSS12.0 software. RESULTS: There were no significant differences in the scores of SCLª²90 between the 2 groups before treatment. After treatment, scores in the therapy group decreased significantly as compared with those in the control group (P<0.05). Personality characteristics of cervical spondylosis patients were emotional instability, tendency of nervousness. Personality characteristics in the therapy group were more stable, the scores of N dimension and P dimension were significantly lower than those in the control group (P<0.05). Barthel index in the therapy group was significantly higher than that in the control group (P<0.05). CONCLUSION: The psychology of the cervical spondylosis patients influences directly the therapeutic efficacy of physiotherapy and rehabilitation training. The introduction of psychotherapy can improve the physiotherapy and rehabilitation effect of cervical spondylosis patients. ......