A Novel Physical Therapy Method of Treating Myofascial Pain Due to Muscle Spasm and Shortening

Abstract

Evaluation of the effect of a novel physical therapy method--post-isometric relaxation taping (PIR-taping)--compared with the effect of a conventional postisometric relaxation (PIR) in the treatment of outpatients with myofascial pain as a result of muscle spasm and shortening of static muscles, resulting in muscle imbalance. The study recruited 320 outpatients with myofascial pain due to muscle spasm and shortening, resulting in muscle imbalance in one of 8 kinetic segments. We treated randomly 8 groups of 20 patients by PIR and 8 matched groups by PIR-taping. The treatment consisted of one procedure daily (PIR or PIR-taping) with duration of 10 minutes for 10 working days. The pain was assessed by a visual analogue scale before and after each procedure. The pain decreased significantly after the treatment course in each group (p < 0.05), but no difference was found between any pair of groups (p > 0.05). The pain before the next PIR procedure tended to increase in comparison with the pain after a previous one, unlike the pain in PIR-taping treatment which tended to decrease. Pain intensity after PIR procedure decreased significantly compared with the pain after a previous one (p < 0.05), while in PIR-taping--after two previous procedures (p < 0.05). Treatment with PIR increased pain significantly during the weekends (p < 0.05), while in treatment with PIR-taping the pain decreased insignificantly during the weekends (p > 0.05). The pain reduced significantly after PIR procedure (p < 0.05), as well as after PIR-taping procedure (p < 0.05). The pain after PIR procedure was significantly lower than that after PIR-taping procedure (p < 0.05), although the pain before PIR procedure was statistically equal with the one before PIR-taping procedure (p > 0.05). Despite the better short-term effect of PIR versus PIR-taping, there was no difference between the final results of both methods, due to the continuous (24-hour) effect of PIR-taping.