Physical therapies in the decongestive treatment of lymphedema: A randomized, non-inferiority controlled study.

Objective: To assess whether the treatment with intermittent pneumatic compression plus multilayer bandages is not inferior to classical trimodal therapy with manual lymphatic drainage in the decongestive lymphedema treatment.

Study Design: Randomized, non-inferiority, controlled study to compare the efficacy of three physical therapies' regimens in the Decongestive Lymphatic Therapy.

Participants: 194 lymphedema patients, stage II-III with excess volume > 10% were stratified within upper and lower limb and then randomized to one of the three treatment groups. Baseline characteristics were comparable between the groups.

Intervention: all patients were prescribed 20 sessions of the following regimens: Group A (control group): manual lymphatic drainage + Intermittent Pneumatic Compression + Bandages; Group B: pneumatic lymphatic drainage + Intermittent Pneumatic Compression + Bandages; and Group C: only Intermittent Pneumatic Compression + Bandages.

End-point: Percentage reduction in excess volume (PREV).

Results: All patients improved after treatment. Global mean of PREV was 63.9%, without significant differences between the groups. The lower confidence interval of the mean difference in PREV between group B and group A, and between group C and group A were below 15%, thus meeting the non-inferiority criterion. Most frequent adverse events were discomfort and lymphangitis, without differences between groups. A greater baseline edema, an upper-limb lymphedema and a history of dermatolymphangitis were independent predictive factors of worse response in the multivariate analysis.

Conclusions: Decongestive lymphatic therapy performed only with intermittent pneumatic compression plus bandages is not inferior to the traditional trimodal therapy with manual lymphatic drainage. This approach did not increase adverse events.