Questions from the Class- My Thoughts on Stretching - Adapted from CSUMB Lecture

Unpopular Opinion Alert: The evidence is lacking on stretchings effectiveness for many measures

“There was high‐quality evidence that stretching did not have clinically important effects on joint mobility in people with or without neurological conditions if performed for less than seven months.”12 Cochrane Review

“Limited evidence showed stretching had no effect in reducing injuries.” Hart L. Effect of stretching on sport injury risk: a review. Clin J Sport Med. 2005 Mar;15(2):113–113. PubMed #15782063. 

“no significant differences in incidence of injury between the prevention group and the placebo group,” and the authors concluded that the exercises “did not influence the risk of developing overuse knee injuries or medial tibial stress syndrome in subjects undergoing an increase in physical activity.”Brushøj C, Larsen K, Albrecht-Beste E, et al. Prevention of overuse injuries by a concurrent exercise program in subjects exposed to an increase in training load: a randomized controlled trial of 1020 army recruits. Am J Sports Med. 2008 Apr;36(4):663–670. PubMed #18337359. ❐

“Despite a few outlying studies, consistently favourable estimates were obtained for all injury prevention measures except for stretching. Strength training reduced sports injuries to less than 1/3 and overuse injuries could be almost halved” Lauersen JB, Bertelsen DM, Andersen LB. The effectiveness of exercise interventions to prevent sports injuries: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials. Br J Sports Med. 2014 Jun;48(11):871–7. PubMed #24100287. ❐ PainSci #53226. ❐