What Is the Acute Effect of Dry Needling on the Active Trigger Points of Upper Trapezius Muscle? The Effect of Eliciting Local Twitch Response on Clinical Outcomes

Abstract

Purpose: Dry needling has been introduced as an effective method to treat the upper trapezius myofascial pain. Muscle damage after receiving the local twitch response can increase the risk of tissue fibrosis in some cases. This study aimed to investigate how the clinical parameters change after dry needling without local twitch response. Methods: This is a quasi-experimental study, with pretest and posttest. A total of 26 patients suffering from neck pain with an active trigger point in their upper trapezius muscles were recurited via the convenience sampling methods. In all patients, the needle was moved 15 times in the trigger point of the trapezius muscle and then remained in place for 5 minutes. Participants were assigned in the dry needling with local twitch response (experimental group) when a local twitch response was evoked from muscle and without receiving local twitch response or deqi (control group) when a local twitch response was not seen. Then, they were treated with one session of dry needling. Before the intervention and 24 hours after the treatment, pain, pain pressure threshold, and neck disability index were evaluated. The obtained data were analyzed by multivariate ANCOVA using SPSS version 20. Results: After the treatment, no significant changes were seen in the experimental group compared to the control group (P>0.05) regarding the pain, the pain pressure threshold, and neck disability index. Conclusion: Dry needling along with receiving local twitch response does not have a superiority over the dry needling without receiving the local twitch response while the treatment aimed to receive the immediate effects.

Keywords

• myofascial trigger point syndrome
• dry needling
• local twitch response