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Effects of long term bed rest on stretch reflex responses of elbow flexor muscles

PainSci » bibliography » Nakazawa et al 1997
updated
Tags: biology, stretch, elbow, sedentariness, exercise, self-treatment, treatment, muscle, arm, limbs

One article on PainSci cites Nakazawa 1997: The Trouble with Chairs

PainSci notes on Nakazawa 1997:

From the abstract: “All subjects showed that both short and long latency stretch reflex FMG activities of muscle biceps brachii were reduced immediately after 20 days bed rest, and then recovered gradually to pre-bed rest levels at one- to two-months after bed rest ....” Note, however, that another muscle studied did not show reflex degeneration in the same conditions.

original abstract Abstracts here may not perfectly match originals, for a variety of technical and practical reasons. Some abstacts are truncated for my purposes here, if they are particularly long-winded and unhelpful. I occasionally add clarifying notes. And I make some minor corrections.

Stretch reflex responses of m. biceps brachii and m. brachioradialis of ten normal adults were studied before and after 20 days of strict bed rest. A standard torque perturbation (15 Nm, 170 ms) was applied to the forearm to induce reflex electromyographic (EMG) activities of the two muscles investigated. Totally 30 perturbations were applied during submaximal isometric elbow flexion movements at 80 deg flexed joint angle, and ensemble averaged EMG waveforms were calculated by aligning the signal to the onset of perturbations. All subjects showed that both short and long latency stretch reflex FMG activities of m. biceps brachii were reduced immediately after 20 days bed rest, and then recovered gradually to pre-bed rest levels at one- to two-months after bed rest, whereas there was no such variation in the stretch reflex induced in m. brachioradialis. It was demonstrated that the muscle stretch reflex gain might be reduced with long-term inactivity, but the effects on stretch reflex gains were different in the two tested muscles.

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