The Use of Neurodynamic Techniques in the Conservative Treatment of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome - a Critical Appraisal of the Literature.

BACKGROUND: Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is the most common peripheral neuropathy, characterized by the presence of many sensory and motor abnormalities. In the physiotherapy of patients with CTS, neurodynamic tech-niques are very common, while the scientific literature does not show clear evidence of beneficial effects obtained by using these techniques. Therefore, the aim of this work was to critically evaluate the use of neurodynamic techniques in the conservative treatment of CTS. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Three electronic databases (MEDLINE, SCOPUS and POL-index) and Google Scholar were queried to find articles. The search terms were combinations of words (in Polish, English and German) contain-ing abbreviated and full versions of the following expressions: carpal tunnel syndrome, CTS, neuromobilization, neurodynamic techniques and manual therapy. RESULTS: Sixteen research papers met the conditions for inclusion in this review. Most of them used different methodologies of therapeutic intervention, making it difficult to interpret the results of individual works. Fourteen studies were randomized trials, one a case-control retrospective study and one was a clinical study without a control group. The most common evaluation variables were pain, nerve conduction, subjective symptoms and function, grip strength, sensation and range of motion. The therapy used neurodynamic techniques carried out by the patient or passive mobilization by the physiotherapist. CONCLUSIONS: 1. A review of existing studies evaluating the effec-tiveness of neurodynamic techniques in the treat-ment of CTS shows that most of them produced beneficial therapeutic effects. 2. Due to a considerable heteroge-n-ei--ty of the parti-cipants, study design and metho-do-logy of thera-peutic interventions, it is difficult to for-mulate a general conclusion. 3. Hence the need arises for further research to assess the effectiveness of neu-ro-dynamic techniques in conservative therapy of CTS based on a similar therapeutic methodology.