Static body postural misalignment in individuals with temporomandibular disorders: a systematic review

BACKGROUND: The association between body postural changes and temporomandibular disorders (TMD) has been widely discussed in the literature, however, there is little evidence to support this association. OBJECTIVES: The aim of the present study was to conduct a systematic review to assess the evidence concerning the association between static body postural misalignment and TMD. METHOD: A search was conducted in the PubMed/Medline, Embase, Lilacs, Scielo, Cochrane, and Scopus databases including studies published in English between 1950 and March 2012. Cross-sectional, cohort, case control, and survey studies that assessed body posture in TMD patients were selected. Two reviewers performed each step independently. A methodological checklist was used to evaluate the quality of the selected articles. RESULTS: Twenty studies were analyzed for their methodological quality. Only one study was classified as a moderate quality study and two were classified as strong quality studies. Among all studies considered, only 12 included craniocervical postural assessment, 2 included assessment of craniocervical and shoulder postures,, and 6 included global assessment of body posture. CONCLUSION: There is strong evidence of craniocervical postural changes in myogenous TMD, moderate evidence of cervical postural misalignment in arthrogenous TMD, and no evidence of absence of craniocervical postural misalignment in mixed TMD patients or of global body postural misalignment in patients with TMD. It is important to note the poor methodological quality of the studies, particularly those regarding global body postural misalignment in TMD patients. .

Recomendações do Enunciado CONSORT para o relato de estudos clínicos controlados e randomizados / The CONSORT Statement Instructions for Reporting Randomized Clinical Trials

O raciocínio clínico e a tomada de decisão pelo profissional de saúde devem ter como base as evidências científicas relevantes e não apenas a intuição ou experiências clínicas prévias não-sistematizadas. Estas evidências são adequadamente obtidas a partir de estudos clínicos controlados randomizados (ECRs), cujas informações são frequentemente relatadas de forma incompleta, prejudicando a identificação de possíveis erros metodológicos. Com intuito de aprimorar o relato de ECR, um grupo de cientistas e editores de periódicos médicos elaborou o enunciado CONSORT, constituído de uma lista de checagem com 22 itens e um fluxograma dos participantes. Atualmente, o CONSORT se encontra traduzido em diversas línguas e em versões adaptadas para atender aos diferentes modelos de estudos. O presente trabalho pretendeu, portanto, facilitar a compreensão de tais instruções, assim como sua divulgação na língua portuguesa, ao abordar brevemente os principais aspectos contidos na versão revisada do enunciado CONSORT.

Clinical strategies and decision making in health care should be supported by the best available scientific evidence not only on intuition neither on previous clinical experience. Randomized controlled trials (RCT) are considered the gold standard for the assessment of interventions efficacy but inadequate report difficulties their interpretation and identification of eventual bias. A group of scientists and editors developed the CONSORT Statement to improve the quality of reporting of RCTs. The CONSORT statement comprises a checklist of essential items that should be included in reports of RCTs and a diagram for documenting the flow of participants through a trial. Nowadays, the CONSORT are translated to several languages and it has been modified to attend different study designs. The present document intended to improve the comprehension of CONSORT recommendations and to spread its use on Portuguese language through a brief discussion of main aspects from the revised version of CONSORT statement.