Effect of Muscle Energy Technique in Patients with Non-traumatic Lumbo-pelvic Pain in the Age Group of 30-40 Years
Authors:   Sr. Physiotherapist, Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya National Institute for Persons with Physical Disabilities (Divyangjan), New Delhi, India, Suresh A M R , Kashyap Dimple ,   Physiotherapist, Deptt. of PMR, Kalawati Saran Children’s Hospital, New Delhi, India
Published: November 2021

Purpose: Pelvic girdle and low back pain have fallen under the diagnostic umbrella of non-specific low back pain (NSLBP). It is true that low back pain can have it’s etiology in pelvic girdle mal-alignment, and similarly low back pain with neural irritation can lead to in co-ordination of muscles causing pelvic malalignment, it is important to understand that motor in co-ordination in the pelvic girdle can be the result of peripheral and/or central mechanisms. Peripheral mechanisms include reflexogenic muscle spasms whilst central mechanisms include cortical inhibition of muscles and/or delayed central transmission due to noxious input affecting intra-cortical synergistic control between various regions of the central nervous system (CNS). Muscle energy technique (MET) is a common conservative treatment for pathology around the spine, particularly lumbopelvic pain (LPP). MET is a gentle manual therapy for restricted motion of the spine and extremities and is an active technique where the patient, not the clinician, controls the corrective force. MET of the low back has decreased pain, increased range of motion, decreased muscle tension and spasm, and increased strength when used with supervised neuromuscular re-education and resistance exercise training. At present, the treatment effect and the outcome of one or two MET session is undefined. This study is designed to determine the effectiveness of brief MET sessions on posterior innominate/ Pelvic pain when used on subjects with non-traumatic pelvic pain. Materials and method: 20 male patients of convenient random sampling based on the inclusion criteria were included in the study and were given muscle energy technique- anterior rotation of Innominate bone for single session once a day for two days and the pre and post treatment outcome were recorded using VAS score and Pelvic inclinometer (PALM) measure. Results: The pre and post treatment effects using paired t-test and the correlation on VAS, shows a decrease of mean and SD from baseline (4.7 ± 1.03) to (1.95 ± 1.14) with (t=14.457, p =.001) indicating a very high level of significance. The pre and post treatment effects using paired t-test and the correlation on PALM, shows a decrease of mean and SD from baseline (10.5 ± 1.50) to (7.1 ± 1.07) with (t=12.803, p =.004) indicating a high level of significance. Conclusion: The results showed that Muscle Energy Technique is as effective as any other manual therapy techniques in the treatment of lumbo-pelvic pain or posterior innominate considered in this study, suggests that MET was highly effective in managing pain and neutralising the pelvic rotation angles with LPP. The treatment is evidenced, and provided as much benefit as any other manual therapy techniques for LPP. Some objective outcomes showed a trend which suggested that there might have been a great interaction if the sample size was larger. Thus the conclusion from this research is that there was a high statistical significance between the pre and post treatment with brief MET sessions in acute LPP.