Effects of kinesiotaping during early post-operative rehabilitation in individuals who underwent a total knee arthroplasty: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized control trials.

OBJECTIVE: To report the treatment effects of early use kinesiotaping on pain, range of motion, mobility, and edema outcomes following total knee arthroplasty. DATA SOURCES: Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, PubMED, SPORTDiscus, Biosis Citation Index, and the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature were searched for potential randomized control trials from inception to 8 January 2024. REVIEW METHODS: Randomized control trials evaluating the effect of kinesiotaping published in English were included. Reference lists for relevant reviews were searched. Study quality was assessed using the Cochrane Risk of Bias 2 tool. Certainty of evidence was determined using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation approach. RESULTS: Seven articles totaling 534 participants were included for meta-analysis. Kinesiotaping with standard rehabilitation when compared to standard rehabilitation alone had very low certainty of evidence in pain and knee flexion range of motion. Kinesiotaping was favored at post-operative days two to four for pain (P = 0.03, standard mean difference = -0.77 [-1.45, -0.09]) and range of motion (P = 0.002, standard mean difference = -0.24 [-0.44, -0.03]). Kinesiotaping was favored at post-operative days six to eight for pain (P = 0.02, standard mean difference = -0.76 [-1.41, -0.12]) and range of motion (P = 0.04, standard mean difference = -0.63 [-1.22, -0.04]). Edema and mobility could not be meta-analyzed. CONCLUSION: The use of kinesiotaping early in post-operative rehabilitation could be a useful modality for reducing pain and increasing the range of knee flexion, however, the certainty of evidence is very low.

Dry Needling for Subacromial Pain Syndrome: A Systematic Review with Meta-Analysis.

OBJECTIVE: The authors of this systematic review with meta-analysis evaluated the evidence for the effectiveness of various applications of dry needling (DN) combined with other conservative treatments for subacromial pain syndrome (SAPS). METHODS: Six databases (PubMED, CINAHL, Biosis, Web of Science, SPORTDiscus, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials) were searched after the study had been registered in PROSPERO. The authors included randomized clinical trials investigating the clinical effects of DN in combination with other conservative interventions for SAPS. Outcomes included pain and disability. RESULTS: Eight studies were selected. All eight studies involving 10 comparisons were included in the analyses (N = 538). A random-effects model was used to analyze between-group effects. Dry needling performed in combination with other conservative interventions produced favorable outcomes at all time points for pain and disability. Standard mean differences ranged from -0.57 (moderate) to -1.29 (large) for pain and -0.69 (moderate) to -1.07 (large) for disability, favoring groups receiving DN in addition to conservative treatment. Four of the eight studies were rated as having unclear or high risk of bias. CONCLUSION: The meta-analysis suggests that various applications of DN performed with other conservative interventions are more effective than conservative treatment alone for reducing pain and disability in patients with SAPS. Direct-comparison studies are needed to determine whether one application of DN is superior to another.