An Investigation of the Acute Effect of Self and Physiotherapist-Performed Upper Extremity Neural Mobilization on Reaction Time in Healthy Young Adults

Abstract

Purpose: This study was planned to investigate the acute effect of neural mobilization on reaction time in healthy young adults. Methods: A total of 120 university students with an average age of 21.75±2.2 years were included in the study. Participants were 30 groups, including self-mobilization (Group 1), self-placebo mobilization (Group 2), mobilization by a physiotherapist (Group 3) and placebo mobilization by a physiotherapist (Group 4) group, in which Ulnar, Median and Radial nerve mobilizations were applied. They were divided into 4 groups consisting of 1 person. SWAY mobile application was used to evaluate reaction time. Ulnar, Median and Radial neural mobilizations were applied sequentially to the dominant upper extremities of the participants, whose first measurements were taken with the SWAY mobile application, for 5 repetitions of 5 seconds each. Immediately afterwards, final measurements were taken with the SWAY mobile application. Results: It was determined that the demographic characteristics and measured reaction time of each group were similar at the beginning and the difference between the groups was not statistically significant (p>0.05). In the measurements made after the applications, it was seen that neural mobilization did not cause a statistically significant change on the reaction time in the self-mobilization, self-placebo mobilization and mobilization by a physiotherapist groups (p>0.05), and there was a statistically significant difference in the placebo mobilization group by a physiotherapist. (p<0.05). Discussions: it was found that neural mobilization caused a decrease in reaction time in the short term, but this change was statistically significant only in the placebo mobilization group performed by the physiotherapist, and it was thought that further studies were needed for more definitive results regarding the effect of upper extremity neural mobilization on reaction time.

Keywords

• young adult
• Reaction Time
• Mobilization
• Placebo Effect

Supporting Institution

none

Ethical Statement

Approval from SANKO University Clinical Research Ethics Committee (GO 2022/10-12, 12.10.2022).

Thanks

We would like to thank all participants for their support. We also thank the SWAY Medical team for allowing us to use their practice in our research.

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