Effect of Kinesio taping on muscle strength in athletes.pdf

Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport (2008) 11 , 198—201

SHORT REPORT

Effect of Kinesio taping on muscle strength in

athletes—–A pilot study

Tieh-Cheng Fu, Alice M.K. Wong, Yu-Cheng Pei ∗ , Katie P. Wu,

Shih-Wei Chou, Yin-Chou Lin

Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Chang Gung University, Taiwan

Received 6 July 2006; received in revised form 31 January 2007; accepted 18 February 2007

KEYWORDS

Isokinetic;

Muscle strength;

Taping;

Kinesio taping;

Athlete

Summary Muscle strength is a key component of an athlete’s performance and may

be inﬂuenced by taping. This study examined the possible immediate and delayed

effects of Kinesio taping on muscle strength in quadriceps and hamstring when taping

is applied to the anterior thigh of healthy young athletes. Fourteen healthy young

athletes (seven males and seven females) free of knee problems were enrolled in

this study. Muscle strength of the subject was assessed by the isokinetic dynamome-

ter under three conditions: (1) without taping; (2) immediately after taping; (3) 12 h

after taping with the tape remaining in situ. The result revealed no signiﬁcant dif-

ference in muscle power among the three conditions. Kinesio taping on the anterior

thigh neither decreased nor increased muscle strength in healthy non-injured young

athletes.

Introduction

Taping is widely used to prevent injury to

athletes. 2 The therapeutic effects of knee tap-

ing include minimising pain, increasing muscle

strength, improving gait pattern and enhanc-

ing functional outcome of patients with sports

injury, osteoarthritis (OA) and patellofemoral pain

(PFP). 3,4

Taping may increase or reduce muscle strength,

and many investigators’ hypotheses to explain the

possible underlying mechanism, including neurofa-

cilitation and mechanical restraint (e.g., Macgregor

et al.) have identiﬁed the relationship between

cutaneous afferent stimulation and motor unit

ﬁring. 5 Conversely, Cools et al. observed no signiﬁ-

cant inﬂuence of tape on electromyography activity

in the scapular muscles of healthy subjects. 2 How-

Kinesio tape, invented by Kenzo Kase in 1996, is

a new application of adhesive taping. It is a thin

and elastic tape which can be stretched up to

120—140% of its original length, making it quite

elastic and resulting in less mechanism constraints,

compared with conventional tape. Kinesio taping,

an organised wrapping technique using Kinesio tape

proposed by Kase, is claimed to be able to reduce

pain, swelling and muscle spasms, as well as to pre-

vent sport injury. 1

∗ Corresponding author.

E-mail addresses: mr5598@adm.cgmh.org.tw ,

ﬁc6481@tcts1.seed.net.tw (Y.-C. Pei).

doi: 10.1016/j.jsams.2007.02.011

Kinesio taping and muscle strength

199

ever, few studies have measured the effectiveness

of Kinesio taping and these studies have obtained

inconsistent results. 1,6 The main goal in this study is

to answer the question whether muscle power could

be changed by Kinesio taping. Hence, this study

investigates the effects of Kinesio taping on muscle

strength after application of taping on the ante-

rior knee and thigh, and the immediate and delayed

effects of Kinesio taping that may be relevant for

clinical application.

Materials and methods

Subjects

Figure 1 The taping method and the subject’s posture

when applying Kinesio taping.

The subjects were the college athletes of the

Nation College of Physical Education and Sports

majoring in kickboxing. Fourteen healthy ath-

letes, seven males and seven females (mean age,

19.7

Test protocol

1.0 years, mean body height 168.9

6.1 cm,

Taping conditions

Three taping conditions were applied to each sub-

ject: (1) without taping (WT); (2) immediately

under taping (IT); (3) 12 h after taping and with

the tape still in situ (AT). Subjects were assessed

in each condition by three daily activities and

muscle strength was measured by the isokinetic

dynamometer.

The order of the three conditions was ran-

domised using a random number allocation table.

To avoid any bias resulting from muscle fatigue

induced by the previous isokinetic assessments,

the inter-assessment intervals were at least

7 days.

8.2 kg), were enrolled in

this study. Informed consent in accordance with

institutional ethical standards of the ethics commit-

tee on human experimentation was obtained from

each subject. Those who reported active knee pain,

trauma in the lower limbs within the previous 3

months or any surgery history for the lower limbs

were excluded.

Instrumentation

The Cybex NORM isokinetic dynamometer (Lumex

Corporation, Ronkonloma, NY, USA) was adopted

to assess concentric and eccentric muscle

strength in the quadriceps and hamstring mus-

cles while contracting at a speed of 60 ◦ /s and

180 ◦ /s.

Subjects were taped with a Y-shaped Kinesio tape

at the quadriceps according to the Kenzo Kase’s

Kinesio taping manual (Kase et al., 1996) 7 by the

same physician. The dominant side of the subjects’

knees were taped. Fig. 1 illustrates the subjects’

posture when Kinesio taping is being applied. The

subjects lay in the supine position with the hip

ﬂexed at 30 ◦ and the knee ﬂexed at 60 ◦ . The

tape was applied from a point 10 cm inferior to

the anterior superior iliac spine, bisected at the

junction between quadriceps femoris tendon and

the patella, and circled around the patella, end-

ing at its inferior side. The ﬁrst 5 cm of tape were

not stretched and acted as the anchor. The por-

tion between the anchor and superior patella was

stretched to 120%. The remaining tape around the

patella remained un-stretched.

Isokinetic muscle strength

Muscle strength was evaluated using a Cybex

NORM. Each subject was given verbal instructions

to maximise effort and was allowed to see the

monitor. The sequence of evaluation was as fol-

lows: concentric quadriceps contractions at 60 ◦ /s;

eccentric quadriceps contractions at 60 ◦ /s; con-

centric quadriceps contractions at 180 ◦ /s and

eccentric quadriceps contraction at 180 ◦ /s. The

same testing protocol was repeated to test ham-

string muscle strength.

Data analysis

Analysis by ANOVA for repeated measures (three

conditions) was used to assess the effect of Kine-

sio taping on muscle strength. Main effect analysis

was applied in cases of signiﬁcant difference among

the three assessments. Estimates of effect size

were analysed using the partial eta-squared method

to describe the proportion of total variability

mean body weight 60.3

200

T.-C. Fu et al.

Table 1 Comparison of peak torque, and total work of quadriceps and hamstring muscles, and functional activity

among the three taping conditions

Concentric/eccentric Velocity

( ◦ /s)

Contractor Condition

p -Value Effect

size

Peak torque (kgm)

Concentric

Quadriceps 43.8 ± 13.4 40.9 ± 12.2 43.0 ± 12.3 0.323 0.083

Eccentric

Quadriceps 45.4 ± 16.1 43.4 ± 14.1 44.7 ± 14.6 0.597 0.039

Concentric

180

Quadriceps 33.2 ± 10.6 32.4 ± 12.0 36.4 ± 12.3 0.027 a

0.242

Eccentric

180

Quadriceps 39.4

13.6 37.9

13.5 41.4

13.8 0.194 0.119

Concentric

Hamstring 26.2

10.3 25.3

9.3 25.6

8.2 0.568 0.043

Eccentric

Hamstring 25.3

7.5 23.7

7.1 24.0

7.0 0.108 0.157

Concentric

180

Hamstring 23.7

8.1 22.9

7.5 22.2

7.2 0.496 0.052

Eccentric

180

Hamstring 21.1

6.8 19.5

6.0 19.5

6.1 0.194 0.119

Total work (kgm)

Concentric

Quadriceps 27.4

8.1 25.7

6.9 26.1

6.6 0.466 0.050

Eccentric

Quadriceps 28.0

10.8 29.1

12.3 29.3

10.2 0.708 0.026

Concentric

180

Quadriceps 22.5

6.2 21.2

6.4 22.9

6.1 0.330 0.082

8.4 0.571 0.033

Concentric 60 Hamstring 22.2 ± 9.5 21.7 ± 8.9 22.7 ± 8.4 0.474 0.056

Eccentric 60 Hamstring 18.9 ± 4.5 18.4 ± 4.8 19.1 ± 5.1 0.582 0.041

Concentric 180 Hamstring 21.2 ± 7.4 19.9 ± 6.6 20.6 ± 7.4 0.486 0.054

Eccentric 180 Hamstring 16.0 ± 4.0 15.6 ± 4.4 16.4 ± 4.0 0.382 0.071

WT: without taping; IT: immediately after taping; AT: 12 h after taping; ab: comparing WT and IT, bc: comparing IT and AT; ac:

comparing AT and WT.

a Difference: AB, AC.

Eccentric

180

Quadriceps 26.7

8.9 28.2

10.9 28.2

attributable to each factor. Statistical signiﬁcance

was set at p < 0.05.

to the thighs and knees of healthy athletes. This

ﬁnding is contrary to the claim that tape applied

under tension in the direction of muscle ﬁbres

facilitates the strength of the underlying muscle. 8

However, this study obtained a result similar to that

obtained by Janwantanakul, 9 who indicated that

taping does not affect the muscle activities mea-

sured by electromyography. In this study, Kinesio

taping applied to skin apparently provided tactile

input. However, tactile input has been reported

to interact with motor control by altering the

excitability of the central neuron system. 10,11 The

negative results observed in this study can be

explained by the fact that tactile input generated

by Kinesio taping may not be strong enough to mod-

ulate muscle power of healthy athletes.

This study does not support the existence of

probable effects on muscle power induced by Kine-

sio taping. Both the target muscles for taping,

the quadriceps, and the antagonist muscle, the

hamstrings, were assessed. Kinesio taping did not

generate any inhibition or facilitation in all tested

muscles. The only signiﬁcant difference observed

for peak torque during concentric contraction of

quadriceps at 180 ◦ /s can be explained as a type

II error resulting from multiple comparisons.

To minimise the possible selection bias, we

recruited the subjects with the same background,

Results

Two data were excluded from data analysis due

to the subject’s factor; ﬁnal data for analysis

consisted of seven males and seven females. All

subjects were healthy athletes, and none com-

plained of pain or discomfort during examination.

Evaluation of comparison of peak torque and

total work of quadriceps and hamstring muscle by

isokinetic assessments was shown in Table 1 . The

ANOVA for repeated measures for the three con-

ditions indicated that WT had the lowest peak

torque among the three conditions in concentric

contraction of the quadriceps at 180 ◦ /s ( p < 0.05).

No signiﬁcant differences existed among subjects

in other assessments. Additionally, no signiﬁcant

interaction effect existed between conditions and

assessments ( p > 0.05).

Discussion

The results suggest that Kinesio taping does not

enhance nor inhibit muscle strength when applied

Kinesio taping and muscle strength

201

the college athletes of the Nation College of Phys-

ical Education and Sports majoring in kickboxing.

We supposed that a relatively homogeneous group

would yield less variance in their performance,

because they were majoring in the same subject

and under the same training course.

In conclusion, Kinesio taping on the knee does

not affect muscle performance of healthy young

athletes. The effectiveness of Kinesio taping for

pain relief, promotion of circulation and relief of

muscle spasm need further investigation in acute

injured athletes in the future.

2. Cools AM, Witvrouw EE, Danneels LA, et al. Does taping

inﬂuence electromyographic muscle activity in the scapu-

lar rotators in healthy shoulders? Manual Ther 2002; 7 :

154—62.

3. Hinman RS, Bennell KL, Crossley KM, et al. Immediate

effects of adhesive tape on pain and disability in indi-

viduals with knee osteoarthritis. Rheumatology 2003; 42 :

865—9.

4. Ernst GP, Kawaguchi J, Saliba E. Effect of patellar tap-

ing on knee kinetics of patients with patellofemoral

pain syndrome. J Orthop Sports Phys Ther 1999; 29 :

661—7.

5. Macgregor K, Gerlach S, Mellor R, et al. Cutaneous stim-

ulation from patella tape causes a differential increase in

vasti muscle activity in people with patellofemoral pain. J

Orthop Res 2005; 23 :351—8.

6. Murray H, Husk L. Effects of Kinesio taping on proprio-

ception in the ankle. J Orthop Sports Phys Ther 2001; 31 :

A-37.

7. Kase K, Tatsuyuki H, Tomoko O. Development of Kinesio

tape. Kinesio Taping Perfect Manual. Kinesio Taping Asso-

ciation 1996; 6—10 :117—8.

8. Morrissey D. Proprioceptive shoulder taping. J Bodywork

Movement Ther 2000; 4 :189—94.

9. Janwantanakul P, Gaogasigam C. Vastus lateralis and vastus

medialis obliquus muscle activity during the application of

inhibition and facilitation taping techniques. Clin Rehabil

2005; 19 :12—9.

10. Ridding MC, Brouwer B, Miles TS, et al. Changes in muscle

responses to stimulation of the motor cortex induced by

peripheral nerve stimulation in human subjects. Exp Brain

Res 2000; 131 :135—43.

11. Simoneau GG, Degner RM, Kramper C, et al. Changes in

ankle joint proprioception resulting from strips of athletic

tape applied over the skin. J Athl Train 1997.

Practical implications

•

Kinesio taping neither decreases nor increases

muscle power in uninjured athletes.

•

The ineffectiveness of changing muscle power

by Kinesio taping is observed immediately and

12 h after the application.

•

The effect of Kinesio taping on muscle power

of injured athletes has not been conﬁrmed yet.

References

1. Halseth T, McChesney JW, DeBeliso M, et al. The effects of

Kinesio taping on proprioception at the ankle. J Sports Sci

Med 2004; 3 :1—7.

Available online at www.sciencedirect.com

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