Release Date: FEBRUARY 4, 2008

There is good news for chronic back pain sufferers. A two and one-half year study on the treatment of chronic back pain sponsored by Independence Blue Cross, a leader in the insurance industry, confirmed the effectiveness of VAX-D.

The purpose of the study was to determine short- and long-term outcomes after VAX-D treatment in a large sample of patients with activity-limiting low back pain that had failed at least two previous, non-surgical treatments.

A total of 296 subjects with low back pain and evidence of a degenerative and/or herniated intervertebral disk at 1 or more levels were enrolled in the study. The sample was primarily composed of middle-aged adults who were currently working and reported moderate to high pre-intervention pain intensity (range, 3.9 –7.3) and moderate pain-related activity limitation. Most subjects had symptoms of greater than 6 months in duration.

In this study all subjects had pre-intervention imaging evidence of lumbar intervertebral disk degeneration and/or herniation.

The study showed that patients had significantly improved pain and disability scores at end of treatment, at 30 days and at 180 days post-discharge.

The authors stated: “ It is important to note that VAX-D differs from most conventional lumbar traction in a variety of ways; the subject is positioned prone on a low-friction surface as opposed to supine on a high-friction surface; a pelvic harness is used as opposed to a thoracic harness; and the protocol indicates a high frequency of treatments over a 2-month period.”

The study on VAX-D was designed, written and analyzed by Expert Clinical Benchmarks, headed up by Paul Beatty, Clinical Associate Professor, Department of Exercise Science at the University of South Carolina.

The study design was a longitudinal single blind prospective case series, the third most reliable outcome measuring tool.