Effects of Stochastic Whole-body Vibration Physiotherapy-WBV (Stochastic Resonance Physiotherapy-SRT) on Muscle Strength in Patients After Kidney Transplantation: a Pilot Study

Background

The increasing incidence of muscular wasting, bone disease, falls and related fractures are the price for excellent survival rates in transplanted patients. Kidney recipients loose significant amounts of muscle mass and skeleton minerals in the early post-transplantation period and suffer from increasing abnormalities of neuromuscular functions.

Recently, stochastic whole-body vibration (WBV) has received much attention as a potential muscle-anabolic and anti-osteoporotic intervention. It is suggested that the randomized low-frequency signals produced during such training can activate otherwise high threshold afferent and efferent motor-neurons and thus may result in a considerable neuromuscular activation. Additionally, there data supporting peripherally-induced central biochemical activation, that meaning the production of CNS modulators due to application of mechanical exercise such as stochastic WBV. The result is a rapid (within minutes), transient force increase. Due to the high number of stimuli-repetitions, it is possible to increase muscle strength using shorter training times (<5 min) than with conventional physiotherapeutic methods (> 30 min). Several experimental and clinical studies have shown that in addition to muscle function, WBV also improved body balance and bone mineral density.

Moreover, a population of renal transplant recipients has not yet been studied elsewhere.

WBV is a very appealing approach, foremost in subjects with limited physical activity; it represents a potentially simple and efficient training method for skeletal muscle and better functional performance, thus preventing falls and consequently fractures.