Could Gentle Electrical Pulses Help Elderly Patients Walk Sooner After Hip Surgery? Published in the journal Clinical Interventions in Aging .

person Savannah Martin
calendar_today Feb 06, 2026
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Hip fractures are one of the most feared injuries in old age.
They strike suddenly, rob independence overnight, and often mark the beginning of long hospital stays, heavy painkillers, and slow recovery.

But a quiet hospital study suggests something surprisingly simple may help older patients get moving sooner — small electrical pulses applied to the skin.

And no drugs were involved.

The hidden problem after hip surgery

After hip fracture surgery, pain is not just uncomfortable — it can be dangerous.

Severe pain makes patients reluctant to walk.
Delayed walking increases the risk of blood clots, pneumonia, muscle loss, and even death.

Doctors often rely on strong opioid painkillers.
But in older people, these drugs frequently cause confusion, nausea, constipation, and delirium.

So researchers in Israel asked a simple question:

Could a non-drug technique reduce pain during walking — the moment that matters most?

The experiment: real electricity vs fake treatment

Researchers at the University of Haifa and Galilee Medical Center studied 41 elderly patients recovering from hip fracture surgery.

All patients received standard rehabilitation.

But half received an extra treatment:

30 minutes a day of real TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation)
Small pads placed near the surgical incision
Gentle electrical pulses at a high frequency

The other half received sham treatment — the machine looked on, but delivered no current.

Neither the patients nor the therapists knew who received real stimulation.

The key result doctors care about

Pain while lying still improved in both groups.

But pain during walking told a very different story.

By day five after surgery:

Patients using real TENS reported more than double the pain reduction while walking
Their pain drop crossed the threshold doctors consider clinically meaningful
The placebo group did not

In plain terms:
The electrical stimulation helped patients tolerate movement, not just rest.

That distinction matters.

Walking farther, sooner

Pain relief translated into action.

By the fifth day:

The TENS group walked significantly farther
They achieved higher levels of independent mobility
They required less non-opioid pain medication

Importantly, there were no reported adverse effects.

Why this surprised researchers

The electrical pulses never touched bone.
They did not heal fractures.

Instead, researchers believe TENS reduced movement-triggered pain signals, making walking less distressing.

This fits with growing evidence that pain during movement behaves differently from pain at rest — and may need different solutions.

Why this matters beyond one hospital

Hip fractures are rising fast as populations age.

If pain during walking can be reduced without drugs, recovery could become:

Safer
Faster
Less dependent on opioids

The researchers caution that long-term outcomes still need study.

But for early recovery — the most fragile window — the results are striking.

The bottom line

A simple, low-risk electrical therapy helped elderly patients:

Walk sooner
Walk farther
Hurt less while moving

And it did so without medication.

Sometimes, the most powerful medical advances aren’t new drugs —
they’re better ways to help the body move again.

Study source

Clinical Interventions in Aging (2019)
Double-blinded, randomized controlled trial
Conducted at Galilee Medical Center & University of Haifa, Israel

Original study (open access PDF):
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6825510/pdf/cia-14-1841.pdf

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DISCLAIMER

This blog post is provided for informational and educational purposes only.

It is a simplified summary of a scientific research study and is not a replacement for reading the original research paper linked above.
Important details, limitations, methods, and full scientific context are available only in the original publication.

This content does not constitute medical advice, diagnosis, treatment, or health guidance of any kind.

The authors of this blog post are not medical practitioners, clinicians, or health professionals.

Any references to electrical stimulation (including TENS, EMS, NMES, or related technologies) are discussed solely in the context of research observations, not personal outcomes or recommendations.

No outcomes described in the study are guaranteed, implied, or personalised to the reader.

All universities, researchers, hospitals, research centres, journals, and publishers mentioned in this article: