Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics
Original ArticleDifferences in Cervical Multifidus Muscle Thickness During Isometric Contraction of Shoulder Muscles: A Comparison Between Patients With Chronic Neck Pain and Healthy Controls
Section snippets
Participants
Twenty participants with chronic mechanical neck pain (CMNP) and 20 healthy individuals voluntarily participated in the study. Participants were recruited from bank office workers. A total of 300 questionnaires containing the study criteria were distributed among them. Then, the researcher collected the questionnaires and announced those who met the eligibility criteria and stated that they agree to participate in the study. Participants were all male and at least 18 years old with no regular
Results
Twenty participants with CMNP (age, 28.90 ± 5.53 years; height, 176 ± 5.98 cm; weight, 73.15 ± 7.82 kg; BMI, 23.44 ± 1.59 kg/m2) and 20 healthy individuals (age, 27.45 ± 4.37 years; height, 177 ± 4.66 cm; weight, 72.85 ± 6.46 kg; BMI, 23.28 ± 1.67 kg/m2) participated in the present study. The independent t test showed no significant difference in age (P = .36), height (P = .81), weight (P = .81), and BMI (P = .75) between the 2 groups.
The independent t test revealed no significant difference
Discussion
We found out that CMM thickness increased while isometric force of the shoulder muscles increased. This finding is seen in both groups.
A possible underlying mechanism for this finding is that the CMM is a cervical stabilizer,24 so it is possibly contracted during performance of tasks by the upper extremities to stabilize the cervical spine. Such findings have been previously reported for the lumbar multifidus muscle. Danneels et al25 reported an increase in the CSA of the lumbar multifidus
Limitations
Male participants were only considered in the present study. It is recommended to compare current results with deep neck muscles behavior in women. Another limitation is that the isometric task did not resemble functional tasks and did not represent normal function of neck muscles. Future studies may be needed to compare the activity of CMM in response to daily tasks in both men and women. The results of this study cannot be generalized to all participants with neck pain, as we only evaluated
Conclusion
The results of the present study suggest that isometric contraction of shoulder muscles causes an increase in the CMM thickness regardless of force direction. This increase was seen in both groups of healthy participants and patients with neck pain. However, less thickness changes were observed in participants with neck pain, which may be interpreted as reduced CMM activity in such people.
Funding Sources and Potential Conflicts of Interest
No funding sources or conflicts of interest were reported for this study.
Contributorship Information
Concept development (provided idea for the research): A.R., and L.R.
Design (planned the methods to generate the results): L.R., and A.R.
Supervision (provided oversight, responsible for organization and implementation, writing of the manuscript): A.R., and M.K.h.
Data collection/processing (responsible for experiments, patient management, organization, or reporting data): L.R., and F.N.
Analysis/interpretation (responsible for statistical analysis, evaluation, and presentation of the results):
Acknowledgment
We thank the manager of Marvdasht Physiotherapy Clinic, Ms Manizheh Saberi, PT, for her assistance in enrolling and screening the participants of the study.
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