Abstract
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of self-exercise for pain in face-down positioning, which is the assumed posture following vitrectomy. Self-exercise included neck and shoulder stretching.
This experiment was conducted on 23 healthy adult volunteers (22.6±2.8 years old) under two conditions. The two conditions were face-down positioning only and face-down positioning plus self-exercise. Study participants maintained a face-down positioning for 90 minutes. Self-exercise was performed beginning 45 minutes after the start of positioning for 5 minutes. Evaluation included a profile of mood states, subjective pain, heart rate, heart rate variability, blood pressure, skin temperature, skin blood flow, etc.
In contrast to face-down positioning only, the self-exercise condition resulted in a lower fatigue score (P=0.039), a lower level of subjective pain in the shoulders (P=0.049), and no decrease in diastolic blood pressure (P=0.040). Therefore, this study exhibited that support for pain relief in the shoulder region can be expected with the implementation of self-exercise during face-down positioning after vitrectomy.
