Study Design: Prospective cohort study. Objective: To assess the effect of 6 weeks of balance training on sensorimotor measures previously found to be deficient in participants with chronic ankle instability (CAI). Background: CAI is the tendency toward repeated ankle sprains and recurring symptoms, occurring in 40% to 70% of individuals who have previously sustained a lateral ankle sprain. Recent studies have found deficits in sensorimotor measures in individuals with CAI. As balance training is a common component of ankle rehabilitation, understanding its effect on the sensorimotor system in individuals with CAI may enable us to optimize protocols to better utilize this rehabilitation method. Methods: Twelve participants with CAI and 9 healthy volunteers participated. Independent variables were group (CAI, control) and time (pretraining, posttraining). Participants with CAI who completed a 6-week balance training program and healthy controls who did not get any training were pretested and posttested at the beginning and at the end of 6 weeks. Results: The individuals in the CAI group who performed balance training demonstrated better performance than control participants on baseline-adjusted posttraining measures of dynamic balance in the anterior medial (P = .021), medial (P = .048), and posterior medial directions (P = .030); motoneuron pool excitability Hmax/Mmax ratio (P = .044) and single-limb presynaptic inhibition (P = .012); and joint position sense inversion variable error (P = .017). It may be of note that no systematic differences were detected for static balance or plantar flexion joint position sense tasks. Conclusions: After 6 weeks of balance training, individuals with CAI demonstrated enhanced dynamic balance, inversion joint position sense, and changes in motoneuron pool excitability compared to healthy controls who did not train. Level of Evidence: Therapy, level 2b. J Orthop Sports Phys Ther 2011;41(2):81–89, Epub 10 November 2010. doi:10.2519/jospt.2011.3365

Objective: This study's objective was to determine the effect of therapeutic massage on peripheral blood flow utilizing dynamic infrared thermography in a constant temperature/humidity thermal chamber to assess noncontact skin temperature. Design: The design was a repeated-measures crossover experimental design; the independent variable was treatment condition (massage, light touch, control). Setting: The study setting was a university research laboratory. Subjects: Seventeen (17) healthy volunteers (8 males/9 females; age = 23.29 ± 3.06) took part in the study. Interventions: One (1) 20-minute neck and shoulder therapeutic massage treatment was performed for each of the three treatment conditions. Outcome measures: The dependent variable was noncontact, mean skin temperature in 15 regions measured at 6 time points (pretest and 15, 25, 35, 45, and 60 minutes post-test) for each treatment condition. Results: The massage treatment produced significant elevations in temperature in five regions: anterior upper chest (p = 0.04), posterior neck (p = 0.0006), upper back (p = 0.0005), posterior right arm (p = 0.03), and middle back (p = 0.02). Massage therapy produced significant increases in temperature over time, compared to the other conditions, in the anterior upper chest, and posterior neck, upper back, right arm, and the middle back. Additionally, the temperatures remained above baseline levels after 60 minutes. Interestingly, the massage treatment produced significant temperature elevations in two nonmassaged areas posterior right arm and middle back. Conclusions: These changes in temperature suggest corresponding changes in peripheral blood flow in the treated areas as well as in adjacent not-massaged areas. Moreover, the results suggest dynamic infrared thermography as a useful tool to measure noninvasive, noncontact changes in peripheral blood flow for massage therapy research.