Evidence for Kinesio Taping in Management of Myofascial Pain Syndrome: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Abstract

Myofascial pain syndrome (MPS) is one of the most common neuromuscular system diseases and is also easily misunderstood in pain clinic. And kinesio taping has been gradually used by physiotherapists or pain clinicians in the pain clinic as a clinical support treatment for MPS. However, no evidence-based medical data is available to support the advantageous effect of kinesio taping on MPS over other treatments at post-intervention and follow-up. PURPOSE: To evaluate the effectiveness of kinesio taping for managing MPS in terms of pain intensity, pressure pain threshold, range of motion (ROM), muscle strength and disability. METHODS: PubMed, EBSCO, ScienceDirect, Web of Science, Cochrane Library and Physiotherapy Evidence Databases were searched from database inception to January 2018. Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) that used kinesio taping as the main treatment protocol for participants diagnosed with MPS were included. Two reviewers independently screened articles, scored methodological quality by using Cochrane risk-of-bias tool and extracted data. The primary outcomes were pain intensity, pressure pain threshold and ROM at post-intervention and follow-up. The secondary outcomes were muscle strength and disability at post-intervention and follow-up. RESULTS: Meta-analyses of 15 RCTs involving 713 patients, showed that kinesio taping was more effective than other treatments in improving pain intensity (mean difference [MD] = 0.94 cm, 95% confidence interval [CI]: -1.55 cm to -0.32 cm, p=0.003) and ROM (standardised mean difference [SMD] = 0.32, 95% CI: 0.12 to 0.52, p=0.002) at post-intervention. Kinesio taping was also superior to other non-invasive techniques in relieving pain intensity at follow-up (MD = -0.68 cm, 95% CI: -1.22 cm to -0.13 cm, p=0.02). CONCLUSION: The latest evidence statistically supports the use of kinesio taping over other treatments for relieving the pain intensity and range of motion of patients with myofascial pain syndrome at post-intervention. Kinesio taping is also statistically superior to other non-invasive techniques in relieving pain intensity at follow-up. However, no significant superiority of kinesio taping was found in pressure pain threshold, muscle strength and disability.