NCT06821022

The Impact of Pain Neuroscience Education on Physical Therapy Student's Knowledge, Attitudes, Beliefs, and Behaviours Towards Pain

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 120 (actual)
• Sponsor: The Hashemite University · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: —
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

This study investigates the effect of pain neuroscience education (PNE) on pain knowledge, attitudes, beliefs and behaviors among undergraduate physiotherapy students in Jordan

Detailed description

Physiotherapy students at the Hashemite University will be randomly assigned into either pain neuroscience education or control lectures groups. Both groups will receive a 70-min didactic group-lecture. The control group will receive education about red-flags which are special screening questions for serious pathology. The red-flags education will discuss tissue pathology and triage for back pain classification. Neurophysiology and the biopsychosocial mode will not be discussed. The intervention group will receive a PNE lecture. All primary and secondary outcome measures consist of validated questionnaires (e.g., RNPQ, HC-PAIRS) or secondary and study-specific instruments that have undergone validation testing.

Conditions

• Healthy Subjects

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Pain Neuroscience Education	The intervention group will receive a lecture of 70min duration on pain neuroscience. The objective of this educational session is to educate students that pain can be overprotective, and that nociceptive transmission can be heavily influenced by central sensitisation (sensitivity of the central nervous system) as well as the thoughts and beliefs of the individual. The session used drawings, stories and metaphors to depict the underlying neuroscience of pain, and current pain theory.
OTHER	Red Flags Education	The control group received an education session of red flags. Red flags form part of routine subjective practice for therapists as a process of screening serious or potentially sinister pathologies. Sign and symptoms for such pathologies include history of cancer, systemic symptoms such as fever or unexplained weight loss, and saddle analgesia. The red flag session will not include the neuroscience of pain.

Timeline

• Start date: 2024-02-15
• Primary completion: 2025-11-17
• Completion: 2025-11-17
• First posted: 2025-02-11
• Last updated: 2025-11-26

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Jordan