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Use Of Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment In Alleviating Hypertonic Chest Wall Pain, David Ho, James Espinosa, Alan Lucerna

Rowan-Virtua Research Day

We present the case of a 20-year-old male patient with no cardiac history coming in for left sided chest pain described as “burning” sensation. On physical exam, it was noted that patient had hypertonic chest wall muscles that were tight and spastic when palpated on the left chest wall. We used Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment (OMT) to help patient relieve hypertonic muscle. We chose to use muscle energy technique (MET) since this relies on reciprocal inhibition with the end result being relaxation of the target muscle.

The patient had resolution of chest pain after applying the technique. Although we did not …