Group acupuncture therapy with yoga therapy for chronic neck, low back, and OA pain in safety net setting for an underserved population (gapyoga) feasibility pilot study: Preliminary results

Objective: To investigate the feasibility of a combined group acupuncture and yoga intervention for chronic pain in an underserved population. Methods: The study was conducted at Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) in New York City. Study participants were referred by their primary care provider and had documented lower back, neck, or osteoarthritis pain for greater than 3 months. Each participant received 10 weeks of intervention: 10 weeks of acupuncture in a group setting;and 8 weeks of yoga therapy directly following acupuncture during weeks 3-10. The primary outcome was pain interference and pain intensity at the 10-week assessment, using the Brief Pain Inventory (BPI), repeated again at 24 weeks. Results: COVID-19 halted our study in March 2020, with 94 patients enrolled. Participant demographics confirmed significant underserved status, with 62% covered by Medicaid;and 23% reporting yearly income less than $20,000. 47% of participants self-reported Black as race;and 44% Latino/Hispanic as ethnicity. At the time of the preliminary analysis, we had 10-week assessment data on 57 participants and 24-week assessment data on 31 participants. BPI data for pain interference at 10 weeks showed a 36% improvement from baseline, and for pain severity a 45% improvement from baseline. Pain interference improvement at 24-weeks showed a 20% improvement from baseline;while pain severity at 24 weeks over baseline showed a 57% improvement. All BPI measures had statistical significance at less than.01. Conclusion: Our pilot study illustrated proof of concept that we could successfully recruit and treat underserved participants with group acupuncture combined with yoga therapy for chronic pain. Preliminary results also suggest that participants achieved improvements in pain interference and pain severity after treatment. These improvements may be maintained in some measure two months after intervention. Further analysis is pending.