Joshua A. Cleland, John D. Childs, Jessica A. Palmer and Sarah Eberhart
The purpose of this study was to determine if slump stretching results in improvements in pain, centralization of symptoms, and disability in patients with non-radicular low back pain (LBP) with likely mild to moderate neural mechanosensitivity. Thirty patients were randomized to receive lumbar spine mobilization and exercise or lumbar spine mobilization, exercise, and slump stretching. All patients were treated in physical therapy twice weekly for 3 weeks for a total of 6 visits. The results showed no baseline differences between the groups but at discharge, patients who received slump stretching demonstrated significantly greater improvements in disability, pain, and centralization of symptoms than patients who did not. The authors conclude that slump stretching is beneficial for improving short-term disability, pain, and centralization of symptoms.
Manual Therapy, Volume 11, Issue 4,