Investigations on Therapeutic Effects of Myofascial Release for Individuals with Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome

• Main Authors: Hsaiw Hung-Yu, 蕭宏裕
• Other Authors: Kao Ming-Feng
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/41111810925923268317

碩士 === 國立臺灣體育學院 === 運動健康科學系碩士班 === 98 === 　　Purpose: To investigate therapeutic effects of Myofascial Release for individuals with patellofemoral pain syndrome. The mechanism for patellofemoral pain syndrome is not well understood; however, it has been suggested that the condition may arise from limited muscle flexibility that alter tracking of the patella within the femoral trochlear notch, contributing to increased patellofemoral contact pressures that result in pain and dysfunction. Specifically, limited flexibility of the quadriceps, hamstrings and calf muscles have been implicated. The main effect of Myofascial Release is used to soften soft tissues. During applying Myofascial Release, therapist uses prolong stretch to loosen soft tissue. Muscle is soft tissue too and poor flexibility on specific muscle groups has been implicated with patellofemoral pain syndrome. Therefore, in this research Myofascial Release was used to soften specific muscle groups on subjects to investigate the therapeutic effects of Myofascial Release on subjects with patellofemoral pain syndrome. Method: 22 subujects (17 female and 5 male) were enrolled to this research. All the subjects were treated with Myofascial Release for three sessions within two weeks. Before and after treatments, Q angle, Anterior Knee Pain Scale(AKPS), PFPS Severity Scale(PSS) and lengths of these quadriceps, hamstrings and calf muscle groups were measured for further analysis. We performed paired t-tests to test for differences between the pre-test and post-test and Pearson's product-moment correlation coefficient to test the levels of correlation between AKPS, PSS and muscle lengths of quadriceps, hamstrings and calf muscle groups. Wilcoxon signed-rank test is used to analyze therapeutic effects for different duration of history. Results: Scores of AKPS, PSS, and flexibility of quadriceps, hamstrings and calf muscles improve except Q angle. Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients indicated that changes in quadriceps flexibility were moderatly correlated with changes in AKPS(r=.482) and changes in hamstring muscles poorly correlated with changes in PSS(r=.387). Wilcoxon signed-rank test indicated that subjects with shorter history(1-10 months) showed better prognosis than subjects with longer history(11-20 months). Conclusion: The results support that increasing flexibility of quadriceps, hamstrings and calf muscle groups by Myofascial Release helps to improve symptom and sign of subjects with patellofemoral pain syndrome. Compared to subjects with longer history(11-20 months), therapeutic effets of Myofascial Release is better for subjects with history within 10 months. Further research is needed to evaluate the long-term therapeutic effets of Myofascial Release and to determine which muscle group has more influence on patellofemoral pain syndrome.