Physical therapy for headaches.

Authors: César Fernández-de-Las-Peñas, María L CuadradoJournal: Cephalalgia : an international journal of headachePublished: January 18, 2018DOI: 10.1177/0333102415596445

Strong EvidenceSystematic Review

Tension Headaches

In Plain Language: headaches, explained

This review examined research on how physical therapy treatments can help people with headaches. The authors looked at multiple studies to understand which physical therapy approaches work best and what the evidence shows about their effectiveness.

Key Findings: what this systematic review found about headaches

✓Physical therapy treatments demonstrate effectiveness for managing headaches across multiple research studies.
✓The review identified specific physical therapy approaches that show evidence-based support for headache treatment.

What This Means for You

Physical therapy has strong evidence supporting its use for headache relief, though this review focuses on conventional physical therapy rather than reflexology specifically.

What This Means for Practitioners

This systematic review establishes that manual and physical therapies have demonstrated efficacy for headache management, providing a foundation for integrating evidence-based techniques into headache treatment protocols.

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Headaches: common questions

What does this study say about headaches?

Physical therapy has strong evidence supporting its use for headache relief, though this review focuses on conventional physical therapy rather than reflexology specifically.

What did this study find?

Physical therapy treatments demonstrate effectiveness for managing headaches across multiple research studies. The review identified specific physical therapy approaches that show evidence-based support for headache treatment.

How strong is this evidence?

This is a systematic review and we rate its evidence strong. It was published in Cephalalgia : an international journal of headache. This study is indexed here for context; it did not test reflexology itself.