APPLICATION OF KINESIOTHERAPY IN CONTROLLING THE SYMPTOMS OF FIBROMYALGIA: AN INTEGRATIVE REVIEW

Abstract

Fibromyalgia is defined as a rheumatological disease of unknown cause and not associated with inflammatory processes, which mainly affects women. Studies show that the treatment of fibromyalgia is focused on kinesiotherapy, which consists of physical exercise programs that provide benefits for fibromyalgia patients. The objective of this research is to identify how the physical therapy practice of kinesiotherapy is used in patients with fibromyalgia to control their symptoms. This is an integrative review based on articles selected from the LILACS, SciELO and PEDro databases. The descriptors applied were: “fibromyalgia”, “physiotherapy”, “physical exercise” and “kinesiotherapy”. The descriptor “fibromyalgia” was used as the main one to obtain more thematic proximity, making pairwise combinations with the others using the Boolean connector ‘AND’. Four articles were selected that meet the study variables. It was noticed that stretching, walking and low-impact exercises have been relevant in the treatment of fibromyalgia, as these factors contribute to improving quality of life. Furthermore, it is possible to observe that the application of supervised physical exercises has better adherence when compared to unsupervised ones, especially for those who are in unstable psychosocial situations, as a large part of this public chooses to practice regular physical exercises and carried out in a group. Therefore, kinesiotherapy is essential in controlling the symptoms of fibromyalgia, as the practice of physical exercises improves muscle strength, flexibility and resistance, in addition to working on cognitive and functional capacity