Comparison of the Short-Term Effect between Iontophoresis and Radial Extracorporeal Shockwave Therapy in the Treatment of Plantar Fasciitis: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Conservative treatments for plantar fasciitis have different levels of effectiveness, so it is necessary to personalize the therapeutic modality that improves the patients' symptoms. Methods: A double-blinded randomized clinical trial was designed to evaluate the short-term efficacy of a physical treatment in chronic plantar fasciitis, namely iontophoresis, compared with radial shockwave therapy. Heel pain, health status using the EuroQol-5D questionnaire, and fascia thickness measured with ultrasound were evaluated. In total, 127 patients were randomly selected for group A and treated with iontophoresis therapy (lidocaine 0.4% and dexamethasone 0.5%), or for group B, in which they were treated with radial shockwave therapy (EWST). Measurements were taken at baseline and at follow-up during the 5 weeks of the study. Results: Statistically significant differences were observed to the shockwave therapy group in respect to the final fascia thickness, and the VAS scale (p = 0.001). The differences between groups A and B showed that the shockwave group follow-up after 3 weeks experienced complete pain remission (1.0 +/- 0.9; 95%CI 0.8-1.2) and after the 6-week follow-up, complete pain remission of plantar fasciitis was observed for both therapies. Patients had a better perception of the use of EWST at the end of the treatment, although in both groups it was satisfactory (p = 0.001). Conclusions: The results of this study showed a shorter-term effectiveness of shockwave treatment compared with the use of iontophoresis. However, both techniques were effective in satisfactorily reducing pain in this short period.