Consumer Perceptions of Home-Based Percussive Massage Therapy for Musculoskeletal Concerns: Inductive Thematic Qualitative Analysis
Notice bibliographique
Résumé
BACKGROUND: Musculoskeletal pain is a prevalent concern among diverse populations, from the average individual to the elite athlete. Handheld percussive massage therapy devices like massage guns have gained much popularity in both medical and athletic settings. Its application has been prominently recognized in injury prevention and rehabilitation. The expansion of the market to provide handheld percussive therapy devices with varying features and price points has encouraged professional and novice use. While percussive therapy holds similarities to more studied therapeutic modalities, like vibration therapy and soft tissue mobilization, there is limited evidence-based information on the indications and contraindications. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to use a qualitative analysis of consumer perceptions to understand the perceived therapeutic potential of percussive massage therapy as a home-based intervention for musculoskeletal concerns of everyday users and elite athletes. Additionally, we aim to gain insight on valuable characteristics supporting its therapeutic potential as well as pertinent limitations. METHODS: The TOLOCO massage gun (TOLOCO) was identified as the best-selling percussive massage therapy device on Amazon. We performed an inductive thematic qualitative analysis on the top 100 positive comments and the top 100 critical comments of the device between June 2020 and April 2023 to determine 4 relevant themes. RESULTS: The 4 themes identified upon qualitative analysis were pain management, versatility, accessibility, and safety and user education. Consumer reviews indicated use for this percussive therapy device in adolescents, adults, and older people across a spectrum of activity levels. Consumers reported the therapeutic potential of percussive massage therapy in managing wide-ranging musculoskeletal concerns like acute pain, chronic pain, nonsurgical injury rehabilitation, postsurgical injury rehabilitation, and injury prevention. Consumers highlighted the versatility of the device to address person-specific needs as a key feature in supporting its perceived therapeutic benefits. Additionally, consumers frequently commented on the affordability and availability of this device to increase accessibility to home-based care. Some critical reviews emphasized a concern for the quality of the device itself. However, this concern did not translate to the overall modality of percussive massage therapy. Of note, despite strong approval for its therapeutic potential, consumer reviews lacked evidence-based insights on appropriate usage. CONCLUSIONS: Home-based percussive massage therapy holds value with its perceived efficacy in pain management for acute and chronic conditions, as well as in injury prevention and rehabilitation. As a low-cost and readily available device for everyday users and high-performing athletes, percussive massage therapy works toward establishing increased health care accessibility and optimizing health care usage. This home-based intervention can serve to reduce the significant personal and economic burden of prevalent musculoskeletal concerns. However, the limited scientific research on percussive massage therapy raises concerns about the lack of evidence-based care and indicates the need for future studies.
Récupéré en direct depuis OpenAlex et désinversé. Les résumés ne sont pas conservés dans cette base de données : les index inversés représentent 8,6 Go des 9,3 Go de texte de la base, et le serveur dispose de 13 Go libres.
Comment cette classification a été obtenuedéplier
Prédiction machine sur la base complète
Imitation des enseignantsNi prévalence calibrée, ni vérité terrain. Validation humaine à venir. Le volet Gemma est une étiquette directe du modèle pour chaque travail de la base, lue sur la notice réduite au titre. Le volet Codex est un classifieur appris des 10 348 étiquettes directes de Codex et calibré sur les taux pondérés de l'échantillon; les champs sans appui suffisant ne portent aucun appel Codex. Le mode candidate est l'union des deux volets; le consensus est leur intersection. Ces sorties portent le statut machine_predicted_unvalidated et ne sont pas des étiquettes humaines.
Scores du classifieur distillé par catégorie (deux têtes)
| Catégorie | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Métarecherche | 0,020 | 0,031 |
| Méta-épidémiologie (sens strict) | 0,001 | 0,001 |
| Méta-épidémiologie (sens large) | 0,001 | 0,001 |
| Bibliométrie | 0,003 | 0,003 |
| Études des sciences et des technologies | 0,004 | 0,007 |
| Communication savante | 0,003 | 0,003 |
| Science ouverte | 0,002 | 0,004 |
| Intégrité de la recherche | 0,001 | 0,002 |
| Charge utile insuffisante (le modèle a refusé de juger) | 0,004 | 0,000 |
Scores machine (provisoires)
Les deux têtes enseignantes du modèle étudiant, lues sur ce travail. Un score ordonne la base pour la relecture; il n'affirme jamais une catégorie, et le statut de validation accompagne chaque rangée tel quel.
Scores de référence d'un modèle non mature (critères de maturité non atteints, 7 itérations). Un score ordonne; il n'affirme jamais une catégorie.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · tel quel depuis la passe de notation : score_only signifie que le nombre peut ordonner les travaux, et qu'aucune étiquette de catégorie n'en découleClassification
machine, non validéePrédiction automatique; un appel candidat d’une seule source (Gemma direct ou Codex distillé), pas un consensus.
Le détail, modèle par modèle et score par score, se trouve en fin de page sous « Comment cette classification a été obtenue ».