Practical Applications
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The application of a cervicothoracic junction manipulation evokes bilateral
Thirty asymptomatic volunteers, 13 men and 17 women, aged 19 to 35 years (mean, 26 years; standard deviation [SD], 5 years) were recruited from the general population. All subjects were right-hand dominant. Volunteers were excluded if they exhibited any of the following: (1) any contraindication to manipulation; (2) aversion to manual contact assessed during physical examination; (3) symptoms in the cervical spine, head, or upper extremities; (4) previous history of whiplash injury or cervical
The intraexaminer reliability [ICC1, 3] of PPT readings, which was determined from the 3 repeated measures collected before the intervention, was 0.97 (95% CI, 0.93-0.98) for the right C5-C5 zygapophyseal joint and 0.94 (95% CI, 0.9-0.97) for the left C5-C5 zygapophyseal joint, suggesting high repeatability of PPT testing. The standard error of measurement was 8.47 kPa for both sides.
A total of 4 men and 6 women aged 19 to 35 years (mean, 25; SD, 5) formed the experimental dominant group; 5 men
The results of this clinical trial showed that cervicothoracic manipulation resulted in an increase in PPT in the cervical region, particularly C5-C6 zygapophyseal joints. These findings are similar to other studies that have shown that manual therapy techniques result in immediate improvements in PPT levels.13, 14, 15, 25 In addition, the effect size for the groups that received C7-T1 manipulation was large, suggesting a clinically important increase in PPT after intervention.
Previous studies
The application of a cervicothoracic junction manipulation induced changes in PPT in both right and left C5-C6 zygapophyseal joints in healthy subjects. In addition, the effect size for the groups that received C7-T1 manipulation was large, suggesting a clinically important increase in PPT after intervention. Different therapeutic mechanisms, either biomechanical or neurophysiologic, can be involved at the same time. The application of a cervicothoracic junction manipulation evokes bilateralPractical Applications
Participants were manipulated up to 2 times according to cavitation. If an audible pop or cavitation was not heard during the first manipulation, the participant was repositioned, and a second manipulative attempt was made.22,41,51 The manipulation of segment C6-7 was chosen owing to the metameric relationship with the forearm region, where PPT records were performed and where TENS was applied.