The British journal of clinical psychology / the British Psychological Society
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Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study Clinical Trial Controlled Clinical Trial
Behavioural rehabilitation of chronic low back pain: comparison of an operant treatment, an operant-cognitive treatment and an operant-respondent treatment.
Seventy-one chronic low back pain patients were assigned to one of three behavioural rehabilitation treatments or a waiting-list condition. The first intervention consisted of an operant treatment, aimed at increasing health behaviours and activity levels and at reducing pain and illness behaviours. In the second intervention, a cognitive treatment, aimed at the reinterpretation of catastrophizing pain cognitions and at enhancing self-control, was combined with an operant treatment. ⋯ This differential effect among the conditions is maintained at follow-up. Patients who received the OC and OR treatments catastrophize less than OP patients, and OC patients showed better scores on outcome-efficacy than OR patients. In general, the results suggest that behavioural rehabilitation programmes for chronic low back pain are effective and that the effects of an operant treatment are magnified when self-control techniques are added.