A recent study found that a 60-minute ?dose? of Swedish massage therapy delivered once a week for pain due to osteoarthritis of the knee was both optimal and practical, establishing a standard for use in future research. This trial, funded by NCCAM and published in the journal PLoS One, builds on an earlier pilot study of massage for knee osteoarthritis pain, which had promising results but provided no data to determine whether the dose was optimal. (The researchers defined an optimal, practical dose as producing the greatest ratio of desired effect compared to costs in time, labor, and convenience.) Osteoarthritis, a degenerative disease of the joints, is the most common type of arthritis, affecting approximately 27 million Americans.
Source: http://nccam.nih.gov/research/results/spotlight/020812.htm?nav=rss