REVIEW   Free access

European Journal of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine 2019 April;55(2):301-13

DOI: 10.23736/S1973-9087.19.05524-2

Copyright © 2019 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Effectiveness of health education in patients with fibromyalgia: a systematic review

María Carmen GARCÍA-RÍOS ¹, Santiago NAVARRO-LEDESMA ², Rosa M. TAPIA-HARO ³, Sonia TOLEDANO-MORENO ⁴, Antonio CASAS-BARRAGÁN ², María CORREA-RODRÍGUEZ ⁵ ✉, María Encarnación AGUILAR-FERRÁNDIZ ¹

¹ Department of Physical Therapy, Instituto de Investigación Biosanitaria Granada (IBIS.Granada), University of Granada (UGR), Granada, Spain; ² Department of Physical Therapy, University of Granada (UGR), Granada, Spain; ³ Faculty of Health Science, University of Granada (UGR), Granada, Spain; ⁴ Department of Physical Therapy, Biomedicina Program of the University of Granada, Faculty of Health Science, University of Granada (UGR), Granada, Spain; ⁵ Department of Nursing, Instituto de Investigación Biosanitaria Granada (IBIS.Granada), Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Granada (UGR), Granada, Spain

INTRODUCTION: Fibromyalgia (FM) is a chronic illness characterized by the presence of generalised musculoskeletal pain among other symptoms, which reduce the quality of life of the patient. Clinical interventions such as patient education on central pain management could lead to promising results. The aim of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of education techniques on the main symptoms such as pain, quality of life, anxiety, functionality or catastrophization in the treatment of FM.
EVIDENCE ACQUISITION: The bibliographic search was carried out on PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, CINAHL, EMBASE, Medline, ProQuest, Cochrane Plus and PEDro databases. The quality assessment of the selected studies was carried out by means of the PEDro scale, obtaining external and internal validity scores to evaluate the generalizability and the appropriateness of design, conduction, and reporting.
EVIDENCE SYNTHESIS: The electronic search produced 2,050 articles up to February 2018. After applying the inclusion criteria, 12 articles were identified, without the presence of any RCT of high methodological quality (PEDro≤8; Internal Validity Score [PVI] ≤4). Despite the heterogeneity of the interventions, a significant reduction in the perception of the disease, the catastrophization, pain intensity and anxiety was observed.
CONCLUSIONS: Patient education is considered to be the first step in self-management for a patient with FM, but the scientific evidence that supports the effectiveness of education in the reduction of the main symptoms is limited. Future research designed on more solid and homogeneous interventions is required.

KEY WORDS: Fibromyalgia; Patient education as topic; Pain management; Quality of life