Treatment of resting muscle tension through transdermal sound waves of specific wavelengths

Introduction: Sound therapy is of increasing popularity for treating conditions such as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), autism, fibromyalgia, Cerebral Palsy (Wigram, 1997) and Parkinson´s Disease (Vincente et al., 1997), tinnitus and pain. It has been proven to be efficient in blood-pressure reduction, general relaxation and pain management (Boyd-Brewer & McCaffrey, 2004; Chesky, 1992; Wigram, 1997), however, to our knowledge, this is the first study to test the influence of a certain sound frequency on muscle status and motoric coordination, measured by multi-frequency bioimpedance and acoustic myography.

Materials and methods: 26 human subjects completed a full study protocol, i.e. two therapeutic sessions. During each session the subjects were measured using an mf-BIA and an AMG diagnostic device before and after listening to either a special frequency sound therapy (Melocura, Denmark, test 1) or normal relaxing music (NRM, test 2). The data were analyzed statistically using GraphPad InStat 3 for Mac (Version 3.0b, 2003; Graph- Pad Inc., La Jolla, CA).

Results: mf-BIA parameters indicated no statistically significant differences between the two tests in terms of improvement of muscular condition and muscle relaxation of studied subjects. On the other hand, AMG data showed statistically significant differences in terms of improvement of muscle coordination and efficiency in favour of Melocura compared with Normal Relaxing Music.

Conclusion: Sound therapy of a certain frequency (Melocura) has a positive effect on muscle coordination and efficiency, measured by AMG and expressed in terms of the E-score. In contrast, Normal Relaxing Music had no proven effect on these same parameters