Pain
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Is there a potential role for attention bias modification in pain patients? Results of 2 randomised, controlled trials.
Potential applications of attention bias modification (ABM) for acute and chronic pain patients are investigated. In study 1, 54 acute back pain patients (46 of whom completed the study) were recruited at their initial physiotherapy session and randomised to receive 1 session of ABM or placebo. Patients were followed up 3 months later. ⋯ Although the results of these studies show that there is potential in the application of ABM to pain conditions, the mechanisms of treatment could not be established. Neither group showed an initial bias towards the word stimuli or a training effect, and only in the acute pain group were changes in biases related to outcome. Nonetheless, the fact that 2 independent samples showed a positive effect of ABM on clinical outcomes suggests that ABM is worthy of future study as an intervention for pain patients.