Effects of Shoulder Exercises with and Without Cervical Exercises on Pain and Function in the Patients with Cervical Spondylosis: Randomized Controlled Trial

Background: Cervical spondylosis is a chronic, degenerative, progressive disease of osteocartilagenous component of cervical spine that is usually age related and more common in men than in women, with a peak incidence between the ages of 40 and 60 years for both men and women. Objective: The aim of the study is to determine effects of shoulder exercises with and without cervical exercises on pain and function in patients with cervical spondylosis. Methods: Sixty eight diagnosed cervical spondylosis patients with 30-60 years of age were selected and randomly allocated in experimental and control groups, 34 in each group. The study was conducted in the physical therapy department of WAPDA hospital, Lahore. All participants were following the 6 weeks supervised exercise program, 4 sessions per week. Experimental group received shoulder exercises with cervical exercises while the control group received cervical exercises. Clinical outcomes were measured with visual analog scale for pain and neck disability index for function. Results: Analysis of final 61 patients were included, 31 in experimental and 30 in control (3 and 4 patients did not follow the study completely). Mean aged for experimental and control group was 49.39 +/- 7.022 and 49.23 +/- 6.704 respectively. Results showed that there was statically and clinically significance difference that as observed in from of reduction of pain P=0.001 and improvement of function P= 0.01 Conclusion: Overall improvement was observed in both groups, results of study shows that shoulder exercises with cervical isometric exercises were more beneficial for outcomes of pain and function in experimental group. So we can conclude that shoulder exercise should be an integral part of treatment for cervical spondylosis patients.