Comparison of efficacy of Active Release Technique with Ultrasound and Strain- Counterstrain Technique with Ultrasound on Upper Trapezius Trigger Points

The purpose of this study was to compare the efficacy of Active Release Technique (ART) with ultrasound with Strain Counterstrain technique (SCS) with ultrasound on latent trigger points on upper trapezius muscle on Pressure pain threshold, Trapezius muscle length & Cervical range of motion.

Experimental

60 subjects with latent trigger points on Upper Trapezius muscles were randomly assigned to one of the 3 groups, 20 subjects in Group A (ART & Therapeutic Pulsed Ultrasound), 20 subjects in Group B (SCS and Therapeutic Pulsed Ultrasound), 20 subjects in Group C (Control Group - Therapeutic Pulsed Ultrasound). Outcome measures were taken pre-treatment and 7th day post treatment.

Statistical significance was accepted at p<0.05. Within group analysis showed that there was significant improvement post treatment in pressure pain threshold, trapezius muscle length and cervical ROM (ipsilateral rotation, contralateral sideflexion) in all 3 groups. When between group analysis was performed, it was found that 1) There was more statistically significant improvement in Group A & Group B when compared with Group C on all outcome measures. 2) There was no difference in improvements between Group A and Group B.

The present study demonstrates that all 3 treatments ie. US, ART with US and SCS with US are effective in treatment of trigger points in Upper Trapezius. There was no difference between the efficacy of ART with US and SCS with US in treatment of latent trigger point in upper trapezius muscle. However both the techniques were more effective than only US treatment.