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Introduction: COVID-19 which is an infectious disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus hurts patients' respiratory health by necessitating oxygen therapy. The affected patients with COVID-19 experience anxiety and stress with quality of life (QoL) impacted due to frequent medication, hospitalizations, fear of dying, and isolation. In individuals with respiratory problems, physiotherapy is useful in improving oxygenation, stress reduction, and QoL. Therefore, our goal was to assess how physiotherapy management affected the oxygenation rates and QoL of hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Materials and Methods: The study included 60 hospitalized cases of COVID-19 pneumonia (25-65 years) admitted to the RCU/Al-Hussein teaching hospital. The oxygenation rate was recorded by hospital monitoring. A physiotherapy management prepared according to the pulmonary rehabilitation recommendations for COVID-19 patients. QoL was assessed by the Arabian version of the short-form health survey questionnaire (SF-36) at baseline, at discharge, and 1 month after discharge. Results: The mean baseline oxygenation percent was 86.10±12.93. The baseline QoL score was 29.14±18.52. A significant increase (P<0.0001) in oxygenation (by 10.22%) was observed at discharge as compared to the baseline values. The QoL was significantly higher (P<0.0001) at 1-month post-discharge as compared to the baseline and the values at discharge (by 157.76%). Similar effects were observed in males and females. Conclusion: A short-term course of physiotherapy management was effective in increasing the oxygenation rates and QoL in hospitalized male and female COVID-19 patients. A combination of breathing exercises, early mobilization, and positioning can act as an adjuvant in the clinical management of COVID-19 patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is a common peripheral entrapment neuropathy with squeezing of the median nerve and the patient is unable to function properly. There are different physiotherapy interventions for the management of these patients and recently, shock wave therapy and low-power laser (LPL) have been widely used, but there is no strong evidence comparing the effect of shock wave therapy and LLLT. Therefore, this trial was designed to compare the effect of extracorporeal shock wave therapy (ESWT), LPL, and routine interventions on clinical outcomes and electrophysiological parameters in patients with moderate CTS. Methods: Fifty-four patients were randomly assigned to the control (routine interventions), ESWT, and LPL therapy groups. All participants received transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) therapeutic ultrasound, hot pack, mobilization, and stretching for ten sessions over two weeks. Additionally, the ESWT group received radial ESWT in four sessions, and the LPL therapy group received laser in ten sessions. The primary outcomes were pain (assessed by the visual analog scale), function (assessed using the Boston questionnaire (BQ)), hand grip, and finger pinch strength. Secondary outcomes were electrophysiological parameters (distal motor and sensory latency and nerve conduction velocity (NCV) of the median nerve. Results: Time group interactions were significant for pain, the symptom severity subscale of BQ, finger pinch, and hand grip strength (P<0.001). Significant improvements were seen in clinical and sensory latency and motor NCV of the median nerve (P<0.05). The ESWT group experienced significant improvements with a large effect size in pain, function, and finger pinch strength compared to the control group (P<0.01). Additionally, the LPL therapy group showed significant changes in the function and finger pinch and hand grip strength compared to the control group. There were no significant differences between the LPL therapy and ESWT groups except for pain in favor of the ESWT group. No significant differences were found among the three groups in electrophysiological parameters (P>0.05). Discussion: Although laser therapy increased the efficacy of routine interventions, it seems adding ESWT to the routine treatment may be superior for the management of moderate CTS patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: Diaphragmatic ultrasound is increasingly used to assess patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). The present study aims to investigate diaphragmatic dysfunction in COPD patients through a systematic review and meta-analysis. METHODS: In December 2022, The researchers studied four international databases such as Medline/PubMed, ProQuest, ISI/WOS, and Scopus. Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) checklist was used to review and control the quality of articles. RESULTS: Finally, 6 articles were included in the analysis. Based on the meta-analysis results, forced expiratory volume (FEV1) was significantly lower in COPD patients compared to the control group (Hedges's g= -2.99, 95 % CI -4.78, -1.19; P =0.001). Forced vital capacity (FVC) was significantly lower in COPD patients compared to the control group (Hedges's g= -1.12, 95 % CI -1.91, - 0.33; P =0.005). COPD patients had significantly lower FEV1/FVC than the control group (Hedges's g= -1.57, 95 % CI -2.33, -0.81; P <0.001). CONCLUSION: The present study showed that the diaphragm ultrasound (DUS) method could identify the difference in FEV1, FVC, and FEV1/FVC indices in two groups of COPD patients and healthy people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This study aimed to investigate the satisfaction rate of patients referred to Bahrami Hospital, Tehran City, Iran, by telerehabilitation and hands-on provision during the COVID-19 pandemic. Case Presentation: Six pediatric patients with torticollis’ disorders, Erb’s palsy, and muscle weakness were referred to Bahrami Hospital. All those subjects were assessed and advised with different exercises and interventions, and then the rest session followed with the online managing with videos or WhatsApp consultation. Then satisfaction rate of the patients was evaluated based on a Likert-type scale. Results: The patients revealed low satisfaction for alone telerehabilitation. However, all patients preferred to combine teleconsultation and hands-on rehabilitation. Of course, they were all satisfied with telerehabilitation. Conclusion: It seems that most patients are afraid of the inability to perform accurate exercises and prefer to come on face-to-face rehabilitation, sometimes used in addition to telerehabilitation and teleconsultation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This study aimed to investigate the foot function, range of motion, plantar pressure, and plantar contact area in the distance runners with normal, pronated, highly-pronated, supinated, and highly-supinated foot posture groups during static standing. Materials and Methods: In this comparative cross-sectional study, a total of 75 distance runners were divided into 5 groups using the foot posture index. The foot function and knee and foot range of motion were assessed using the Foot And Ankle Ability Measure questionnaire (FAAM) and the goniometer, respectively. The mean of the plantar pressure percentage and the mean of the contact area on the forefoot and rearfoot were investigated during static standing. One-way ANOVA was used to compare the outcomes between the groups. Results: Among the groups, the normal foot group showed the highest scores in the activities of daily living subscale and sport subscale. Compared with the other groups, the highly-pronated foot group had a significantly greater range of motion in the ankle plantar flexion (P<0.002), and the normal foot group showed more range of motion in the first metatarsophalangeal extension (P<0.0001). In all groups, the mean plantar pressure percentage on the rearfoot was greater than the mean plantar pressure percentage on the forefoot. Of the groups, the highly-supinated foot group showed the highest plantar pressure percentage on the rearfoot (P<0.0001). However, the highly-pronated foot group showed the highest plantar pressure percentage and the largest contact area on the forefoot (P<0.0001) and the rearfoot (P>0.0001), respectively. Conclusion: Based on the results of this study, the foot posture is an important option that could affect function and range of motion of foot and ankle and distribution of the plantar pressure and plantar contact area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This review article aims at finding papers comparing conventional treatment with new interventions in females affected with Stress Urinary Incontinence (SUI). Therefore, we selected papers with exercise therapy and Electrical Stimulation (ES) compared with vibration therapy. Materials and Methods: We searched PubMed, Scopus, Ovid, and Springer for the papers published in English and the field of human-study registered from 2009 to 2019. The articles should be about Pelvic Floor Muscle Training (PFMT), Electrical Stimulation (ES), and new intervention like vibration in the treatment of SUI. Results: We managed to identify 1276 articles on this topic. After deleting duplicate articles, we chose 22 of them. Based on the inclusion criteria, only 7 articles were finally included in this review article. PFMT and ES are conventional treatments, but some studies have focused on the efficiency of new modalities, such as vibration in the treatment of SUI. Discussion: Based on our review, new intervention (vibration) has superior effects over ES and PFMT in the treatment of SUI; however, ES and PFMT are the first line of therapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Constraint-induced movement therapy (CIMT) forces the use of the affected side by restraining the unaffected side. The purpose of this article is to explore the changes of motor and functional performance after modified CIMT (mCIMT) in comparison with traditional rehabilitation (TR) in chronic post-stroke patients. Materials and Methods: A total of 12 patients randomly assigned into two treatment groups. Six patients in the mCIMT group received intensive training in a more affected limb for 2 hours daily, 5 days/week using shaping method over a period of 21 days. Participants less affected limb were restrained in arm - hand splint with a target of wearing it for 5 hours daily. The patients in TR group received bimanual and unilateral activities, stretching, strengthening and coordination exercises of the impaired side, tone modification and coordination exercises of the affected side. The focus was to increase independence in activities of daily living activities using affected side. The motor activity log (MAL), wolf motor function test (WMFT), and modified ashworth scale were measured at pre-test (1 day before training), post-test (1 day after training) and follow-up in 3 weeks after training. Results: The Friedman test found significant differences between pre-test, post-test, and follow-up in MAL and WMFT in mCIMT group. Furthermore, mCIMT group showed significant decreased spasticity (P = 0.030) that measured by ash worth scale. The effect sizes between post-test and pre-test in the above-mentioned outcome measures were moderate to large in mCIMT, ranging from 0.3 to 0.76, but in TR group the effect size were small, ranging from 0 to 0.2. Conclusion: Therefore, it seems that the mCIMT treatment was more effective than TR in improving some parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]