Clinical trial NCT01844271: Low Level Laser Therapy in Muscle Fatigue and Muscle Recovery
Official title: Low Level Laser Therapy in Muscle Fatigue and Muscle Recovery After Exercise: What is the Ideal Dose?
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: COMPLETED
Phase: NA
Conditions: Muscle; Fatigue, Heart
Skeletal Muscle Recovery
Keywords: LLLT
muscle fatigue and recovery
phototherapy parameter
Lead sponsor: University of Nove de Julho
Sponsor class: OTHER
Collaborators: name: Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo
First posted: 2013-05-01
Enrollment: 28
Sex: MALE
Minimum age (years): 18
Maximum age (years): 35
Standard ages: ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: no
Allocation: RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: PARALLEL
Primary purpose: PREVENTION

Brief summary: Muscle fatigue and muscle recovery after exercise are recent areas of research involving Low Level Laser Therapy (LLLT) and many factors remain unknown, such as optimal doses, power and application parameters, mechanisms of action, effects on long-term exercise and the long-term effects on skeletal muscle recovery.

The present research project aims to assess the effects of long-term recovery of LLLT in skeletal muscle after exercise and identify the optimal dose application of LLLT.

After defining the best dose of application, we recruited two groups which will be irradiated with different power, 100mW and 400mW in order to seek the optimal parameter of low level laser therapy in performance.

The investigators believed that the Low Level Laser Therapy can delay the physiological process of muscle fatigue, reduce injury or skeletal muscle microdamage arising from physical effort and accelerate muscle recovery after exercise.

Detailed description: To achieve the proposed objectives it was performed a randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trial, with voluntary participation of high-level soccer athletes.

Participants received an application of low level laser prior to execution of a strenuous exercise. It was used a laser with a cluster of 5 diodes (810 nm, 200 mW each diode) with different doses (placebo, 2J, 6J, 10J) and power of 200mW.

In a second step, with the optimal dose already defined, this was used to be applied with different powers in two experimental groups, 100mW and 400mW.

The investigators analysed parameters related to volunteers exercise performance (torque peak / maximum voluntary contraction), delayed onset muscle soreness, and biochemical markers of muscle damage (CK and LDH), inflammation (interleukin 1 and 6, alpha tumoral necrosis factor) and oxidative stress (TBARS, CAT, SOD and carbonylated proteins). The analysis was performed before exercise protocols, after 1 minute, and 1, 24, 48, 72 and 96 hours after the end of exercise protocol in both parts of the study.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

* professional soccer players aged between 18 and 35 years old;
* not presenting historical musculoskeletal injury in regions of the hip and knee in the 2 months preceding the study;
* not making use of pharmacological agents and/or nutritional supplements;
* participating with minimum frequency of 80% of the training team

Exclusion Criteria:

* athletes who experience musculoskeletal injury during the study;
* athletes who for whatever reason have their training routine changed with respect to the rest of the team during the course of study.

Primary outcomes:
measure: Exercise performance (MVC and peak torque)
timeFrame: Maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) was performed before the exercise protocol and repeted 1 minute, 1 hour, 24, 48, 72 and 96 hours after the eccentric contraction protocol. The peak torque was performed after 3 minutes of LLLT application.
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Blood tests (composite measures)
timeFrame: Analysis of biochemical markers of muscle damage, inflammation and oxidative stress before exercise protocols, after 1 minute, and 1, 24, 48, 72 and 96 hours after the end of exercise protocol.
Other outcomes:
measure: Delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS)
timeFrame: The analysis were performed before exercise protocols, after 1 minute, and 1, 24, 48, 72 and 96 hours after the end of exercise protocol.
Locations:
city: São Paulo
country: Brazil
facility: Nove de Julho University
state: SP
Study officials:
affiliation: Nove de Julho University
name: Adriane A Vanin, PT
role: STUDY_CHAIR
References:
citation: Baroni BM, Leal Junior EC, De Marchi T, Lopes AL, Salvador M, Vaz MA. Low level laser therapy before eccentric exercise reduces muscle damage markers in humans. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2010 Nov;110(4):789-96. doi: 10.1007/s00421-010-1562-z. Epub 2010 Jul 3.
citation: de Oliveira AR, Vanin AA, De Marchi T, Antonialli FC, Grandinetti Vdos S, de Paiva PR, Albuquerque Pontes GM, Santos LA, Aleixo Junior Ide O, de Carvalho Pde T, Bjordal JM, Leal-Junior EC. What is the ideal dose and power output of low-level laser therapy (810 nm) on muscle performance and post-exercise recovery? Study protocol for a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial. Trials. 2014 Feb 27;15:69. doi: 10.1186/1745-6215-15-69.