Comparison of the immediate and short-term effects of myofascial induction technique and joint mobilization technique on pain intensity, awareness, functionality in patients with chronic neck pain

Our study was carried out to compare the effectiveness of myofascial induction technique and joint mobilization technique in patients with chronic neck pain. Sixty-one patients with chronic neck pain were randomly separated to myofascial induction therapy (MIT) (mean age: 45.26 ± 10.46 years) and joint mobilization therapy (MOB) (43.6 ± 10.74 years) groups. Participants in both groups received treatment in a single session (average 30 minutes). In our study, pain intensity, neck awareness, disability and functional activity level, joint range of motion (ROM), deep neck flexor muscle endurance (DFME) were considered as outcome measures. All outcome measurements before, immediately after treatment, and one week after treatment were performed by the treating physiotherapist. Both treatment approaches in our study provided significant improvement in all parameters except ROM (p<0.05). ROM values improved significantly in the right lateral flexion value in the MIT group, and in the flexion and rotation (right and left) values in the MOB group (p<0.05). It was determined that both treatments were not superior to each other in terms of pain severity, neck awareness, disability and functional activity level, DFME in patients with chronic neck pain (p>0.05). Results obtained from our study showed that MIT and MOB approaches are effective in patients with neck pain. Comparisons between groups, showed that the two treatment modalities were not superior to each other except ROM. In ROM, it was observed MIT was more effective in increasing right lateral flexion and MOB in increasing flexion and rotation (right-left). Our study showed that a single session treatment applied to patients with chronic neck pain had a healing effect on pain, awareness and functional level immediately after treatment. The continuation of these effects for one week suggested that manual therapy applications are an effective treatment approach in chronic neck pain.