A systematic review of EEG neurofeedback in fibromyalgia to treat psychological variables, chronic pain and general health

Abstract

This paper is the frst up-to-date review of the various EEG-neurofeedback treatments for fbromyalgia patients and their psychological, physiological and general health consequences. Searches were made of the PubMed, PsycNet, Google Scholar and Scopus databases according to PRISMA guidelines for empirical peer-reviewed articles on EEG-neurofeedback treatment of fbromyalgia, yielding a fnal selection of 17 studies that met the inclusion criteria: (1) published articles and doctoral theses; (2) conducted between 2000 and 2022; (3) reporting empirical and quantitative data. These articles show that there is a wide range of protocols with diferent designs and procedures to treat fbromyalgia using EEG-neurofeedback techniques. The main symptoms that showed improvement were anxiety, depression, pain, general health and symptom severity, whilst the most commonly used method was traditional EEG neurofeedback based on a sensorimotor rhythm protocol. It may be concluded from the review that the lack of consistency and uniqueness of the protocols makes it very difcult to generalise results, despite the individual improvements identifed. This review provides instructions and information that could guide future research and clinical practise, with the data extracted helping to gain a deeper understanding of the state of the art and the needs of the technique for this population group