Abstract
Objective: The current study was designed to determine if the direction of application of Kinesio® tape has an effect on the time to peak muscle torque of the concentric quadriceps contraction in the healthy young adult population. Background: There are many proposed effects of Kinesio®Tape, but the available research on these effects is limited and of poor quality. Previous studies have shown that when the tape is applied from muscle origin to insertion with 25-50% tension on the tape, the time to peak muscle torque is decreased. There have been very few studies investigating the inhibitory effect that Kinesio® tape claims to have by applying the tape from muscle insertion to origin. Further research is necessary to explore the true effects that the directionality of application of the tape has on healthy muscle function. Methods: This study was a randomized clinical trial consisting of 21 participants who performed 10 repetitions of maximum effort concentric quadriceps at 60 degrees/second, 120 degrees/second, and 180 degrees/second in a randomly assigned order of three taping conditions over three testing days. Each participant performed 10 repetitions of maximum effort concentric quadriceps contractions with one of the three taping conditions and without tape on each of the three testing days. The order of taping versus no taping was randomly assigned in addition to the order of the three taping conditions: facilitory Kinesio®Tape application, inhibitory Kinesio®Tape application, and no tension “placebo” Kinesio®Tape application. The Biodex system 4 Pro Isokinetic dynamometer was used to measure the force production of concentric knee extension. Results: The 21 participants (mean ± SD age, 25.0 ± 3.63) completed all three testing days of the study. Data analysis displayed no statistically significant differences in maximum peak torque across all 4 taping conditions (facilitory, inhibitory, no tension placebo, and no tape) at all 3 velocities (60 deg/sec, 120 deg/sec, 180 deg/sec) with p values of 0.506, 0.441, and 0.306 respectively. Analysis of the time to peak muscle torque across all four taping conditions at the three velocities tested revealed no statistically significant differences with p values of 0.056, 0.835, and 0.264 respectively. The time to peak muscle torque at 60 deg/second was further analyzed due to the fact that the p value was close to 0.05. A pairwise comparison among the taping conditions revealed that facilitory taping (from muscle origin to insertion) had the most impact on the decrease in time to peak torque (decrease of 49.52 milliseconds). Analysis of the torque per body weight across all four taping conditions of the three velocities revealed no statistically significant differences with p values of 0.577, 0.894, and 0.691 respectively. Conclusions: Neither facilitory nor inhibitory effects were observed between various directions of application of Kinesio® tape in the healthy young adult population when analyzing peak muscle torque. However, the present study suggests that the facilitory application of Kinesio®Tape decreases the time required to generate peak torque at the velocity of 60 deg/second during a concentric quadriceps contraction. This finding can have important implications for athletes that utilize Kinesio®Tape to improve their sports performance.