166: Does Research Support What We Do? (with Bodhi Haraldsson)

About this episode

Bodhi Haraldsson discusses the relationship between massage research and clinical practice, emphasizing the importance of understanding research limitations.

🎙 Does Massage Research Actually Work? (with Bodhi Haraldsson) Bodhi Haraldsson is a registered massage therapist, researcher, and self-described “pracademic” who has spent over 25 years bridging the gap between clinical practice and scientific inquiry. He joins Whitney on The Thinking Practitioner to talk about one of the most important — and most misunderstood — questions in our profession: what does the research actually tell us about massage therapy? Bodhi’s journey into research began at McMaster University — the birthplace of evidence-based practice — where he joined the Cochrane Cervical Overview Group and helped author a landmark systematic review on massage for mechanical neck disorders. That review, first published in 2006 and later in Spine, analyzed thousands of studies down to just 14 qualifying trials — and found that most of the evidence was limited or unclear. Nearly 20 years later, a 2024 update reached essentially the same conclusions. But this isn’t a discouraging story. It’s a call to understand what research can and can’t tell us — and why that matters for every practitioner. Bodhi and Whitney explore why absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, why…

People in this episode

Host: Whitney Lowe

Guest: Bodhi Haraldsson

Topics covered

• massage therapy
• research
• evidence-based practice
• clinical practice
• systematic review

Keywords

• massage research
• evidence-based practice
• Cochrane review
• mechanical neck disorders
• clinical inquiry

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: McMaster University, Cochrane Cervical Overview Group

Books & works: Spine

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